The past ten or so minutes had been an absolute hail storm of confusing emotions and social situations for me, and most of it I could attribute to Stan and what I was pretty sure were definite signs of his degrading sense of morality.

Not only had we slogged into the sewers, but I’d also ‘abandoned’ my friends, nearly been eaten by a bunch of zombies, been kidnapped, had said kidnapping justified, stared on as Stan shot people who could’ve been friends, and then, to top it all off, I’d had Cara basically tell me to take any opportunity to kill Stan.

She didn’t know though, she couldn’t know that by offing him in the game I’d also be killing him in real life.

But that’s when things got really difficult for me.

I had no idea if Stan was planning to kill me too.

The guy had left me in a pretty good position to die, and he’d gone to great lengths to convince Cara that that was the only way it was all going to work out.

“Almost out,” Stan whispered from the front of our little group as we wandered through the maze of tight tunnels Tim had marked for his friends, “there’s a ladder up here somewhere.”

“Can we please go back to being silent?” Cara asked with no small amount of trembling in her voice before adjusting the settings slightly on her goggles, “Last thing we need is for a bunch of zombies to get us boxed in down here.”

“No way they’re getting in here.” Stan replied as he rounded a tight bend in the tunnel, “If they could, they already would have.”

“See, you think your confidence makes you seem all smart, but it doesn’t, it just makes you sound like a cocky tool.”

I wanted to tell them to stop bickering, but the last time I did they vanished, and while the situation was slightly different, I wasn’t quite ready to start tempting fate.

So, instead of forcing the arguing to stop, I simply asked “How far?” before exaggerating a false seethe, “My foot’s really starting to hurt.”

Suddenly we stopped, and for a second I thought that Stan had seen through my ruse, mostly because I was the kind of person who kept my pain to myself, but was allowed to breathe a silent sigh of relief when I saw that we’d simply found the ladder.

“We’re home free, my friend.” Stan said before leading the way up the ladder, “Home free…”

That’s when Cara shot me a sharp look and gestured her head toward the completely defenseless and unsuspecting Stan as he climbed further up the ladder.

She was right, it was the perfect time to strike, Hell, he wouldn’t even see it coming, and there was every chance that, if I got the shot right, he’d never know.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

I couldn’t do it though.

I couldn’t put a bullet in my friend’s back.

With that being said, I couldn’t let Cara know that I’d chickened out, so opted to shake my head and mouth ‘Too loud.’ to which she sighed and nodded.

“You guys coming or what?” Stan joked as he neared the top of the ladder, “I’m pretty sure we’re right on the edge of town, near that farmland, you know?”

“I know the place.” I said, trying to hide the fact that my internal GPS said that we were nowhere near the farm, “You almost up?”

“Yeah,” Stan replied as finally reached the top and shifted the manhole cover, spurring Cara to mount the ladder and start her begrudging climb up after him, “this thing goes higher than I… thought. Hey, guys? I think it might be an idea for us to maybe not come up here…”

“And why would that be?” Cara asked while continuing to climb, an obvious and almost aggressive irritation coming through in her voice.

“Well, turns out we might not exactly be under the farm.”

“Where are we then?”

Stan didn’t respond for a few seconds, then sighed as he accepted that there wasn’t any other way to put his words, “I think we might be in the heart of Voltown.”

“Oh, God-” Cara started to growl then stopped as she realized how loud she was being, “How many?”

“No way to tell,” Stan whispered coolly as he shifted down and let the cover close, “too much fog, but I don’t think we should chance it.”

“We might not have a choice…” I muttered after a guttural groan rumbled from somewhere in the tunnels, “I think we’ve got zombies down here.”

“Shit.” Cara cursed under her breath, “Are you sure?”

I hesitated to answer long enough to have one of what I was sure to many zombies clambered around the corner in front of me, its one remaining eye glowing a sharp green through my night vision goggles.

“Finn, are you sure?” Cara repeated from above me, both her and Stan having climbed down since I mentioned the zombies.

“Pretty frickin’ sure.” I replied as I stared down the motionless zombie, “Go up. Now.”

The zombie wasn’t doing anything, like it couldn’t trust its own senses, but instead of using the opportunity to run like any smart person would do I went on staring.

“What are you doing..?” I trailed off curiously.

And then it happened, two strong hands grabbed my shoulders and I was left to swing back wildly with my elbow, catching the ninja zombie in gut and forcing it to lose its grip as the one that’d been glaring at me made its move.

I was done waiting around though, and started scrambling up the ladder, not wanting to fire for fear that I’d deafen myself and leave not only me, but the two others with me to the ravenous appetite of the zombies.

“Go!” I bellowed as I clawed my way up the ladder and saw that Cara and Stan were still just waiting there.

“But what about the-”

“Get the fuck up the ladder, now!”

That roared command was enough to make both Cara and Stan start moving again with a speed and fervor that I hadn’t seen either commit to since meeting them.

“They’re climbing up!” Cara hissed after chancing a look past me.

“Doesn’t matter, keep climbing.” I replied, my voice taking on a colder tone as true panic started to set in, “Move the manhole.”

“But we don’t know how many are up there.” Stan said, “At least down here we know we only have to deal with those tw-”

“If you get me killed down here I swear to God I’ll take you with me.” I practically snarled as Cara and I were forced to come to a stop due to Stan’s insistence on trapping us.

Stan was dumbstruck for a moment, but was quick to follow my order, if not for my threat, for the zombies that were almost in arms’ reach of us.

I think I knew that that was when Stan realized exactly where he stood with me, and I know that that was when I knew I’d hit the point of no return with him.

The desperation to be the last man standing was truly starting to bubble over, and there was absolutely no stopping it.