Alex waved the red flag a few more times as she stood on top of the command center. It was supposed to signal unexpected danger and request reinforcements, but she could see the other command centers were all responding with yellow flags. "Hold on, you're probably just going to die because we're too scared to come help you," basically. Vas and Miiche were fighting with Hades below, and Joust was helping Selene defend the entrance to the building.

She set the flag down. She was going to have to kill all of these stupid monsters. Just had to get to Vas and--

At that moment, the ash in the sky acted oddly. Something about the way it cleared away. Lights suddenly appeared from the Wall, as if the power had suddenly decided to work again. Then Alex heard something she hadn't heard in a long time. Gunshots. Not from the Wall, but from right next to her!

She glanced over the edge of her building, only to see the worst outcome. Risen throughout the battlefield around the command center had revealed that their guns-which she'd assumed were junk-were working! Obviously, a lot of the guns didn't work. Even with firepower returning to the world, they still had gone unused for a long time. A fair number even backfired. Alex cursed when she saw Vas go down to more than a dozen shots. Miiche, who'd been next to him screamed and managed to attack the Risen closest to her, but she also fell after a few more bullets. That Risen looked oddly familiar, but Alex decided not to think about it too much... Lots of Risen looked familiar these days.

Fortunately, it looked like Miiche had done enough damage to the Risen she'd attacked, and even more fortunately that Risen had been a commander-type! When it fell, so did the majority of the gun-wielding Risen around the command center.

"Get the guns!" Alex shouted, hoping the people nearby would hear her and listen, since at the moment everyone seemed to prefer standing still.

Alex ran inside the command center to see Joust holding multiple bloody bandages across his chest and shoulders. Selene was tending to wounds on his back, and when she saw Alex, she shook her head sadly. Joust wasn't doing well.

"Joust, where's your gun?" Alex asked, hoping to bring some levity to their situation.

Joust help up an assault rifle, to Alex's surprise. "Here, commander." Joust looked pale, but he had a satisfied smirk.

Alex grinned, surprised. "Where's Sun?"

Joust shook his head. "I think you actually are the commander, Alex."

"Well sh..." Alex glanced around the room of dead eyes, people without hope. "Sure. I'm a great commander. Let's shoot these zombie creeps apart til they have to use their teeth to crawl around."

Selene gave Alex a smile, playing along as best she could. "What should we do next?" Good. Hope. Missions. Assignments. Something to do.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Alex thought for a few moments, knowing that she had to think fast. "We need to take advantage of the confusion. The lights are back on, in the Wall." Alex held up two fingers, looking around. "We've got two options. One, we go to the Wall and hope they let us in. Two, we try to kill our way to one of the other command centers. I'm in favor of the Wall, but mostly just because it's a shorter walk." One of the men leaning against a nearby table coughed, and Alex was pretty sure he was just trying not to laugh.

"Oh, and grab guns. They're, you know, working now." A couple of people snickered, and Alex clapped twice. "Let's go!" Everyone stood, or did their best impression of it, and they made their way out of the command center. Everything outside was chaos, and Alex just tried to get the attention of people who were still alive as they went. She picked up guns, shot them at Risen until they were empty, picked up other guns, and kept on going that way.

When they neared Vas's bloody corpse, Alex patted his hair. "You did good."

It was hard not to cry when Selene broke down and hugged the bloody figure, and even the fading Joust seemed devastated. "Keep moving!" Alex shouted. She had to drag Selene with her. The people around her were able to make a good perimeter simply due to the fact that the vacant Risen around them that had belonged to the defeated commander were blocking their view from the aggressive Risen.

Unfortunately, even as they neared the tunnel to enter the Wall, Alex noticed something wrong. Aggressive Risen seemed to be coming from the Wall. It would explain a lot if the Risen had been able to gain a foothold when the Wall lost power.

Even worse, as they neared the elevator, along with a hundred normal Risen, a huge Risen blocked their path. He'd been planning to enter the Wall as well. Hades. No matter how many bullets went into the creature, he seemed to be regenerating. He mostly ignored them, bent on getting into the Wall. The elevator arrived at ground level, and dozens of Risen burst out as the doors opened. Hades ignored everything and entered the elevator.

"Shoot the elevator!" Alex couldn't let him win. She knew he'd probably get into the Wall somehow anyways, but she wanted to spite him one last time. "Bring it down!" Glancing to her side, she saw that Joust had fallen over. He was unconscious now. Alex grabbed his gun and fired at the elevator. Selene followed suit. Eventually, one of the bullets did its job and snapped some cord, sending the entire elevator screaming back to the ground level at top speed.

Alex and Selene, and around seven other people fended off the dozens of Risen rushing them. Alex ran out of bullets first, and switched the grip on her gun to bludgeon an oncoming monster. "YOU!" She heard the angry voice of Hades call out as he burst through the Risen and people in his way. Hades swept a large sword at her, and she dodged, cutting at his huge leg with a blade she'd drawn. It healed in front of her eyes, and she dodged away from Hades' next attack. Next to her, Selene was cut down by a Risen.

At that moment, she resolved herself. She wouldn't become one of them. She waited for the opportune moment, and positioned her neck in the perfect place to meet Hades' blade. That was the end.

----------------------------------------

Alex woke on a comfy mat... Bed?

Beginning re-initiation. Personalities integrating. For a moment, she was two people. Then, suddenly, she was whole again. Eva sat up. "Cassie, when is my interview?" Cassie, Eva's personal assistant, responded by adding the thoughts to Eva's mind. She would be interviewing Atrau Bvoptins and Carni Fersov. She'd known them in the game as Vas and Fem. It was going to be a little weird to try and put her feelings aside as she interviewed them.

Eva sighed. Just thinking about the last game gave her chills. It had been so awful, so terrifying. She wanted to go find Jade, Selene, Joust... Give them hugs!

In fact, after these interviews, she was going to do just that.