Two knights hurried along a dark hallway in the haunted factory. Their metal feet squeaked on the laminated flooring. They stumbled over each other stopping at the opening ripped through the wall leading outside. A cold wind blew in from outside the destroyed bricks where the color scheme became monochrome. The debris led to a path climbing a small hill.
“Should we follow this explosion?” asked Mooseman.
“I’d say so it’s our only shot really, chief,” said Zito, peeking out.
“I knew this place was dark but now it's simply black and white only,” said Mooseman.
“Well man at least it doesn't look like the place is filled with more ghouls to kill yet, ” replied Zito, heading up the path.
“Gulp, Don’t fucking curse us. We saw the footage, maybe this is already king Edward's final resting place, and soon to be ours,” shuddered Mooseman.
“Okay let’s sneak around, try to find that tower that collapsed with the King on the roof and see if he's still alive, and if not an exit,” said Zito.
“Yup this graveyard is the only path going forward, but it’s also a circular sandbox of sorts to navigate," whispered Mooseman.
“Let’s keep the sound snuffed,” finished Zito.
They crept outside the factory walls. A row of fresh burials behind gravestones welcomed them to the new area. A single moon hung in the core of the planet. It cast shadows that moved like tides through a hole in the ceiling.
Suddenly an amplified cackle rattled the massive cavern. Mooseman jumped in fright with the hairs on the back of neck trying to split. There was a lot of groaning going on. The buried soil of unmarked graves hands slowly rose to unsoiled buried bodies. A dead knight pulled itself from an unmarked plot right next to their feet.
“Ahh the dead have been raised by a witch!” yelled Zito, dodging a zombie grabbing at his armor.
The creature tried to bite at the neck, but was kept at distance with both hands. Mooseman stood awkwardly trying to aim his shotgun without double tapping his friend. Zito continued to struggle in close quarters with the creature that towered overhead.
“A little help here man. Fuck bash the thing with blunt force,” he screamed.
Mooseman stood thinking for another second before it hit him what he was supposed to do. He turned the weapon around and started bashing the zombie's head. He hit, and hit stunning the creature from immediate attack using the butt of the boomstick.
Zito was able to wriggle free. He struggled backwards off balance, pulling his blade for a counterbalance.
“Braaains,” many voices groaned in agreement on a life goal.
The closest zombie knight had turned its focus onto Mooseman. Zito charged, and swung his sharp weapon. The dead helmeted head bent sideways half chopped by sword. Zito grunted and struggled to free the weapon while the headless creature was confused. He started kicking the meatbag in the back with equal amounts of effort. The zombie fell over, while he kept his sword in hand. It was trying to rise again, and hungrily chomping at the bit.
“Crunch!”
Two large feet jumped on the head crushing it underfoot. There were growing groans for breakfast all around them. The mob of the walking dead had been continuously unearthing. Every second they stayed still they were growing closer to being completely surrounded.
“I think we got some company,” Zito said, stabbing a creature through the straps of its overalls, and aiming his revolver in the other hand.
"Bang!"
His first bullet knocked a rotten cowboy hat off a decomposing skull.
"Boom!"
A shotgun blew the face off another dead attacking them.
In addition to the zombies a massive pack of skeletons blindly wandered between the crypts in the background. They had already begun to splinter apart after being summoned by the necromancer Nancy. She cackled from the sidelines while her troops hunted every crevice for meat. She was blind and thus had to use her zombie's eyes to see by returning to their heads.
She could only see one creature's vision at a time. It wasn’t that she was fully controlling them, instead all she could do was mark a general point for the horde to swarm. Previously She had directed her dead to climb the tower where Edward, and Ned had dueled over the hook.
She was too hyper focused on men and missed what was happening right underneath.Her carriage driven by the non-responsive dead horses smashed out of control through the grave-sites. She had lost control of everything when the same tower collapsed spooking the horses who continued to throw fits. The speeding carriage of empty coffins couldn’t be stopped, and neither could her summons.
“Damn it. Why didn’t I put another corpse in the passenger seat for eyes on the road,” she said, slapping her skull repeatedly. “After that bitch disabled me I’ve yet to fully adapt to a blind life among the dead,” she hissed “Stop horses or you will turn us both to dust,”.
The skeleton horses smashed through a brick wall. She had adopted both of them because of a shared bond of having no eyes, but they had proved extremely stubborn, and hard to train. She had managed to find the reigns, and worked to halt them unsuccessfully.
“Halt Howard, and Ducky! Why won’t you stop running?” she cried, throwing the reins away in frustration at being unable to fully control her creations.
“Guess I gotta bail, but I'll be bone dust on impact,” she sighed, fumbling around.
Her skeletal fingers searched for the button to recline. She dropped back the seat until hitting coffins stacked in the trunk. She felt for a spare as the cart bounced two and fro. She heard something splinter off to smash somewhere behind the charge. They must have been going past a steep turn because everything aboard was shifting. Nancy grabbed a hold to the handles while riding on top of a coffin. She swung beside it, and threw open the door.
“Bon voyage,” she said, climbing inside.
She slammed the coffin lid, while screwing the key from her armor. She unlocked the locks strapping the cargo with chains, and slammed shut the covers. The dead horses had only increased their pace, and unbeknownst to them or Nancy straight towards a cliff.
They were long out of the graveyard climbing a massive overhanging ledge that hung over a void of nothing. The steep incline began to slide the coffins off one at a time out of the carriage as it shook, rattled, and tumbled over bumps. Only about half of the cargo had fallen off the wagon as it barreled over the edge. The dead horses continued to haul the remaining cargo as they fell for eternity into the void of nothing.
Meanwhile Mooseman, and Zito were beginning to accept themselves joining the ranks of the army of the dead surrounding them. The end was shambling closer and closer within the cramped graveyard. A hundred of the corpses already lay on the ground in bits and pieces no longer walking. It looked like ten times that number still waiting for a chance to grab a bite to eat. The entire graveyard had risen, and the two knights looked to be the dessert tonight.
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“Well it was nice fighting with you until the very bitter end of things buddy,” said Vito, overwhelmed with targets to attack with his sword.
“Boom!" said Moosemans broomstick, knocking apart two dozen with explosive crystal loads.
“Let’s go through the path I just cleared,” he boomed, while chomping a lit cigar, and loading two more red shotgun shells.
They sprinted forward, slowed by dodging the hands in the grass grabbing out. The opening in the horde was rapidly closing. The path was steep onto a muddy road filled with holes of black water.
A large iron gate at the proper cemetery entrance. There the skeletons stumbled blindly in every direction in this area. The two knights hastily crouched through the mob of slumbering bones. The chasing zombies stumbled from every direction behind filling the road. The armored dead pushed aside anything that clipped them as they swarmed the tombs groaning in frustration, unable to find any food. On the roof of one of the tombs Moosemen, and Zito hid from behind cover.
“Psst Moose that rubble might be where our king lies, R.I.P.,” whispered Zito, pointing his revolver at the big pile of rubble where the tower had previously stood.
Mooseman lay plopped on his stomach twisting out his cigar stump on the granite underneath.
“Yup I’d say he’s dead like them ghouls out there alright. No doubt about it” he said.
Zito sighed. “I think our last option here is to try and find those Elves we saw on the footage earlier, and bribe them to help guide us,” he whispered, tightly clutching his backpack.
“Or we follow whatever that is out of here,” said Mooseman pointing his stogie at the cave ceiling.
Zito followed his eyes to the shadowy figure swinging high above them. The thing swung back and forth gathering momentum throwing shadows through the air before a hook shot to another point stopping his free fall.
Edward swung across the gap in the cavern ceiling leaking moonlight. A king of the castle with his old hook retrieved, and upgraded. He swung out of the graveyard like he had mutated into a half spider. He flew to the far side of the massive cavern and passed the hanging rock of battered coffins around a tree.
High above the path curved into a spiral staircase heading deeper underground. He swung back and forth until he was hanging still. Edward unlocked the device attached to his missing hand. It slowly retracted, repelling him to the ground while the hook remained anchored in the rocks above. The king landed on the ground and he jerked his hand to undo the hook in the ceiling. It fell as he slowly started winding the wires back into place.
“It’s good to have you back baby, I missed you so sweet hooker,” said Edward, kissing the device.
The nearby coffin shook and rumbled with vigor. It was wedged between rocks having fallen onto the door. Edward raised his eyebrows and aimed his hook at the commotion.
“Hey a zombie fish in a barrel,” he laughed in amusement.
The sound of the horde of zombies was increasingly growing from the graveyard.
“Nah might as well stay locked up,” he said, shaking his head and turning to leave the area.
The occupied coffin stopped moving behind as he entered a small tunnel providing an exit. Edward would find the way out of this mess to save his kingdom, and whatever remained of his family. He fumbled around in the dark,swiping his crystal cutter in front. It clanged against something dripping water.
Edward stopped to take out a secret box from his clothes, and felt himself combining ten matches into a mini torch. He struck a match against the official D.D.P. matchbox. The light was still black and white. The entrance was several steps from him running face first into it.
“Uuuuugh this room better at least have some schlock for me to drink on,” he cried.
He shot the hook blowing open the waterlogged wooden door, and advanced winding the hook as he went. This was a medium chamber that appeared to be a dead end. He threw away the stub of matches burning his five, and only fingers. This was a circular cave chamber lined with intricate tapestry hung. Two enclosed pits burned magma coating everything in a red hue. In the center is a carved polished stone with three empty holes. Edward stubbed his foot on something and almost cut himself limping around in pain. He looked down in anger at the culprit three blocks of stone.
"Hmmm," he said, picking up the heavy stone triangle.
He saw a square hole, a round circle hole, and then the triangle cutout. He tried to shove it into the circle like a dick.
“Just kidding, I was only pretending,” he told himself, putting the triangle into its cutout.
The room rumbled as part of the wall slightly retracted before stopping ⅔ down. He hooked onto the circle rock, and grabbed the square. He put them in their respective holes. With the puzzle solved the wall fell revealing a generic office area. The lights flickered on automatically above. Edward paced back and forth on the laminated tiles looking for clues.
The medium room had six rows of three bulky metal desks covered in papers. A single filing cabinet lined the back wall while a single control panel ran the other length. Above the panel full of buttons, nobs, screws, levers, and flashing lights ran a wide window. Behind the window was what looked to be another generic factory setting. Above that window a sign read “Safe Houses and Crystal centers inc”.
“Gosh darn it the core is so fucking corporate,” sighed Edward.
The factory viewed from here was nothing, but an empty warehouse, with the exception of metal support beams, cobwebs, and some kind of track rail system bolted along. The king raised his hook aiming at the rail outside the glass.
"Well let's see where this one leads," he madly cackled.
“Smash!” said the hook, breaking the window as it was launched.
It shot through the air hooking onto the rail. Edward wound frantically after the hook that was racing away with sparks. The tension immediately pulled tight and he was launched forward after it.. He growled, flung down a dark spooky corridor at high speed. The rail shot over the top of a warehouse composed of many large dark shadows, and silhouettes. He smacked through a rubber blanket and was whipped by cold air. Edward launched into a massive open ice cavern full of tiny homes hanging. Some had lights on, some did not. He rapidly rounded a corner, swung too far and smacked through several icicles.
“Brrrr,” said Edward, covered with snow dust.
He sped past identical one door, and windowed boxes after another floating in air. A floating library of 100s of safe houses creaking in the breeze attached to off tracks off the main air rail. He swung around another corner and tried to disconnect his hook to land on a porch. He tried again but it was locked into the rail. He slammed sideways spinning like an out of control top. The hook ground round a bend carrying him inside the depths of another factory area.
“Zzzz,” said Mooseman, snoring on the roof of the tomb.
“Man even asleep you risk blowing our cover,” whispered Zito, on the roof of the next structure over.
Skeletons shambled around knocking blindly into stones. The zombies groaned, shuffling out of the area. It was almost time to make a run for the king, but that was probably the same place the zombies were going. Little time had passed since they had climbed here to hide, but it already felt like an eternity.
Zito jumped the short gap between roofs landing next to the sleeping knight who’s large gut rumbled. Vito adjusted his slung backpack enough to remove a tin can rectangle. He peeled back the sharp aluminum to reveal fish filets in mustard juice. The food was exposed below Mooseman’s nose. It immediately caused a drooling reaction, as he bit into the air like a hungry hippo.
“Psst it’s time to wake, gobble this snack, and find the king,” said Zito, taking out a fish.
He began to feast. A cold hand grabbed his wrist.
Mooseman snatched the container from Zito, and ate four fish at once.
“Thought you would hog all the food when I was sleeping huh?” He loudly questioned.
“Nope, I need to wake you as the corpses have gone, and we still have a king to find,” said Zito, extending a hand.
The knight helped pull the other to his feet who was three times as big.
“The skeletons have gone back to bed” said Mooseman looking over the side of the tomb.
“Huh they were just functioning” said Zito, looking around piles of bones littering everywhere. “Let’s tip toe out of here so as not to wake the dead” he finished whispering.
The ground began to loudly rumble, and shake all around.
“Creak.. CRASH!”
The two knights fell through the roof breaking their fall on ceramic urns. The moonlight showed through the broken ceiling where they sprawled in a pile of debris, and ashes. A crystal statue carved in armor watched them from the end of the tomb. They quickly got to their feat, and readied their weapons, as the ground continued to quake. Mooseman charged forward kicking apart the rotten wood boarded across the tomb exit.
They were in one of many tombs circling an empty mound of soil. The skeleton bones rumbled, and bounced towards a central location. A femur jointed into a hundred others while the spines fused into one thick chord. The skulls attached themselves everywhere, laughing from every section of the towering monster. It jerked shedding bone fragments as the mass formed six legs underneath it, and claws. It scuttled sideways like a crab clicking bones. The gravestones disintegrated before the creature toppled a tomb. The sounds continued further away as the creature rampaged through the graveyard. Both knights had hidden behind the exit to the tomb. Zito peeked out his head.
“Psst I think the coast is clear. That thing is headed in the same direction we saw the king swinging, maybe we should try another way man,” he whispered.
“Burp.. Farc this place but forward is the only way forward,” replied Mooseman.