The area they enter is starkly different from the one they depart. The towering skyscrapers and commercial buildings of the city centre give way to smaller, less imposing structures in the residential area. The transition is strange, from the modern buildings to the old-world aesthetic of Earth neighbourhoods. The only similarities are the snow and zombies.
The original settlers of Grave had had a vision for their cities, striving to copy old Eastern European design, from which most of them had hailed. Anachronistic yellow brick-and-mortar houses line the streets, quaint reminders of a bygone architectural era. Despite their ancient appearance, the residences had been built with the latest technology and comforts available to humankind, even though almost none is functional anymore.
The homes are closely set together near the street, each with a long, narrow yard stretching out behind. These gardens, once filled with plants and gatherings, are now just barren patches of snow and ice. The sole sign of life are the genetically modified softwood trees that are slowly taking over the planet, and the strange bulbous purple vines of Grave.
Even though the town has an old Earth feel, the streets were built wider than roads on Earth to accommodate large, modern vehicles. Now, those vehicles sit rusting and frozen, half-buried in snow. Some have a zombie strapped into a seat, rustling slightly at the presence of Luka coming near. They do not shift for Rigo or Sceps.
Sceps ranges ahead of Rigo and Luka, slightly out of view, scouting the area for living humans. The two men follow Sceps’ trail of zombie bodies. Usually, Rigo and Sceps try to avoid killing zombies because the corpses lying around can signal to others that there are living around, but Rigo knows that Sceps is trying to avoid a horde forming and going after Luka. Even in the snowstorm it is possible. Rigo will hear many complaints about this after they get the man back to Arkhangelsk.
The zombies only stay destroyed for a few days and sometimes only hours; after a while the virus that had wrecked this planet drags them back into animation again. Rigo is certain several of his former bodies walk around the planet as zombies. He has most certainly seen a Sceps zombie at one point, even though Sceps crossly denies it.
Harsh wind claws at the men. The wide streets offer little protection from the biting wind as it sweeps through them, but the narrow alleys between the houses provide some respite. The wind pushes the snow in front of it, building drifts against the building and bites through Rigo and Luka’s thick clothing. Sceps ignores the cold.
The snow crunches under Luka’s feet, giving texture to the night air. Rigo turns his head to look at the man, ankle deep in snow next to a fence.
“Walk on the pavement, not the snow,” Rigo directs Luka with a growl.
“But it’s open, zombies will get me.”
“Snow is loud, walk on pavement,” Rigo repeats flatly.
Rigo sighs to himself. This is the work of guides, not retrieval experts like themselves, even though they had begun as guides many years before. They would be better off carrying Luka’s dog tags in Sceps’ pocket with the others and letting his body become a zombie. They would probably end up doing that anyway; Rigo does not really believe the man will make it the entire way back to the spaceport on foot. Still, something stops Rigo from shooting the tourist in his head. Hopefully it is a last shred of humanity.
Luka walks into the middle of the road, fearfully looking around, as if he expects to be run down by zombies. The shivers that grip him are not just from the cold. He holds his elbows in a hug against what lurks in the shadows.
As if to distract himself from the cold and terror, Luka reaches into his backpack and pulls out an antique camera. Rigo shakes his head ruefully as the tourist begins to take photographs. The German seems to know instinctively to not take photographs with the two corpse hunters. He does not point the lens in their direction. They do not like records of their activities.
Many of the roofs of the structures around them sag and the walls crumble. Despite the modern building techniques and materials some structures are beginning to collapse into the street. Snowstorms have swallowed a few of them, creating mounds of debris covered by snow where buildings once stood. Some are so deeply buried in drifts that only the tops of chimneys remain visible, like the gravestones in a cemetery. Luka seems fascinated with the decrepit structures and takes many pictures of the decay.
In this area, the presence of zombies seems to be sparse. The few that do appear are easily avoided or silently dispatched by Sceps. Most of them are frozen into the ice, unable to move towards Luka even as they sense his presence. Luka, who doesn’t appear to notice that the zombies are only attracted to him, continues to snap photos with his ancient camera.
Rigo looks for a building that would be a suitable camp for the night. They pass by more decrepit houses, some completely buried in drifts, others partially exposed, their windows shattered and doors hanging off hinges. Luka is starting to lag behind the two better-conditioned men as the cold starts to take a toll on him. Rigo stops occasionally and waits for the tourist to catch up. Neither he nor Sceps like having the man behind them.
“You have no drones?” Rigo asks Luka after watching the man catch up to them. Usually, the tourists and guides have several drones orbiting them, broadcasting a livestream across the galaxy. The streams were watched by millions of viewers, the ones who could not afford an expensive safari trip to Grave. They were intensely popular because the viewing public loved the chaos. Rigo, Sceps, and Marten stayed away from those activities; they did appreciate them, however, because the carnage gave them an income.
“No, I like the old technology. Like my Winchester.” Luka responds. He takes some close-up photographs of an abandoned ground car, rusted with ice that sparkles in the moonlight.
“I like your gun too.” Rigo tells him. Rigo likes all guns.
“Oh? It has been in my family for generations. Would you like to see it?” Luka says enthusiastically. He unslings it and holds it out.
Rigo raises his eyebrow. No one ever offers a gun to someone on Grave. Giving a gun to someone in the wastelands is the same as handing them your own death. He shrugs. Luka knows nothing apparently. He takes the heavy gun.
Rigo inspects the break-action rifle with childlike delight he attempts to hide from the other two, especially Sceps, who will find his fascination amusing. Guns are just tools to Sceps.
Rigo runs his fingers along the loading mechanism. The mechanism can break open to load and unload bullets into the breech. The rifle has a dark red stock, which has intricate checkering in the wood for a nice tight grip, and the metal surfaces have been blued to a shine. The high-quality old-Earth steel barrel is about sixty centimeters in length. It is not as long as the barrel of Rigo’s sniper rifle, but this barrel is much heavier than the barrel of the stellium gun. There is no scope on the gun’s iron sights, but Rigo remembers that Luka is only a tourist hunting zombies. Rigo notes that the safety has been engaged even though it is not loaded. Both deadly choices on Grave. He hands the gun back to the tourist.
“Load it and put it over your shoulder. Never in your hands, unless I tell you.” He doesn’t tell him to turn off the safety.
Luka looks pleased for a moment, then a grim expression crosses his face as he has a dark thought. He probably realises that Rigo does not mean for it to be loaded to shoot zombies. Nevertheless, Luka carefully cracks the gun open and loads two copper-tipped .308 bullets into the rifle. These bullets are slightly smaller than the ones in Rigo’s sniper rifle. Luka swings the gun back onto his shoulder. He adjusts the thick strap, so it lies smooth over his jacket. It will be slower for him to grab and aim the gun than the two corpse hunters, who have breakaway clasps holding their guns.
Silence falls over the group as they walk; the only sound is the clicking of Luka’s camera. Sceps is hidden in the shadows ahead of Rigo and Luka.
“Hmm,” Sceps’ voice comes through the communication link, “Dead tourist group.”
Rigo and Luka hurry to catch up to Sceps, who is standing in the doorframe of an empty house. Sceps turns sideways in the doorframe and points at the floor just inside. There is a pile of bodies: four tourists, all men dressed in crisp new military gear, and two scruffier men who look like they might be guides. Their bodies are riddled with bullet holes. Zombies did not kill these men.
“No dog tags,” Sceps reports, tapping the closest body with his foot, making its head turn to show the blank neck. He moves into the building, followed by Rigo and Luka, who recoils in horror at the sight. No dog tags probably means they had probably been killed by corpse hunters. Corpse hunters who still might be in the area.
“A couple hours old. Maybe turn soon,” he conjectures.
As if Sceps summons it by voicing the possibility, the zombies begin to lurch and stand. Sceps moves in front of Rigo, to cover him as much as he can with his clamshell armour. Both men hate situations like this, trapped in a small space with a small horde of zombies. They need to destroy all of them with as little noise as possible.
Luka dives into a corner of the room behind an overturned table while Sceps and Rigo turn to put their backs to the walls. They don’t want the zombies to swarm them from all sides. The zombies turn towards the table Luka is cowering behind. All six of them go toward him.
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The corpse hunters pull out their stellium knives. Rigo also hits the release clasp on his backpack, letting it hit the floor, so it does not encumber him. Holding their armoured forearms up, they prepare to fend off the zombie if they turn to them. Neither of them are worried about being infected, they both have been inoculated. Even though neither Rigo nor Sceps are truly worried about the creatures, they can do them a lot of injury if they overwhelm them.
The zombies are large and corpulent. Fresh zombies can be harder to deal with than older ones, which are often brittle with the cold. These zombies ooze brackish blood, and their eyes roll loosely in the sockets, not yet changed to the typical dendritic pattern. The zombies do not pick up the weapons the living men had used, instead they reach and grab the tourist to rip him apart.
Luka scrambles backwards, trying to get out of the reach of the zombies. His relative calm while dealing with the mostly frozen and sedate zombies has evaporated in the face of fresh zombies. Rigo doubts he has ever seen fresh ones before.
Sceps reaches the small pack of zombies before Rigo. He slices the neck of one of the zombies, nearly taking its head off. It slumps to the floor again, with limbs akimbo and neck dripping sludgy blood.
Rigo hangs back, slightly behind Sceps, who has more body armour than he does. He raises his knife, holding the hilt so the blade extends away from his little finger, towards his forearm. With a backhand swing, he plunges the knife into the shoulder of another zombie, another dead tourist, and drags the blade along the shoulder to the neck. The clothing and skin of the zombie rip like paper. Its torso twists, arms flailing wildly. One of its arms catches another zombie and both fall to the floor. Sceps yanks his blade of the neck of the zombie he destroyed and plunges it into the front of the neck of the downed zombie.
The final three zombies are trying to reach for Luka across the overturned table. Luka finally collects himself and drives his own knife upwards, into the chin of a zombie. The knife buries itself in its jaw but does not hit the spinal cord to destroy it. Luka twists to his left, turning the zombie with him, using the knife as a lever. Rigo manages to swing and rip its neck. The body of the zombie falls on Luka, momentarily protecting him from the last two zombies. Sceps uses this moment to quickly take out the final creatures.
“Time to move, Luka,” Rigo says, not giving the man a chance to catch his breath. He grabs the tourist and hauls him upright.
“What?” Luka looks around confused. He seems slightly stunned.
Rigo sighs. They need to move not only because the zombies will re-animate again and they will have to destroy them again, but because whoever killed the group originally may be nearby.
“They are all destroyed. Let’s go, there are corpse hunters close,” he says to the tourist. There is no way they’re going to get this man back to Archangelsk. The man nods. Sceps growls at the tourist, who cringes backwards momentarily before following them out of the house.
“Come,” Rigo says calmly despite the urgency. Sceps may kill the tourist anyway, he thinks.
They walk through the streets for another hour before Rigo decides that Luka cannot take anymore. He hopes they are far enough away from whomever killed the tour group. He spots a suitable building to camp in and tells Sceps to return on their communication device.
The building is almost intact, with just broken windows and a roof that is partially caved in. The front door is off its hinges and snow has piled inside. The upper stories are filled with even more snow, but the basement is clear. The heavy, solid walls offer protection from the elements and attackers alike. After a quick sweep of the interior, they confirm the house is clear of zombies and other threats. Sceps has seen no sign of the corpse hunters either.
Sceps pushes debris across the front doorway to create a barricade. He pulls a heavy, broken table across the entrance, stacking chairs and other furniture on top to create a makeshift barrier. This won’t stop a determined intruder, but it will at least give them a warning if someone approaches.
Rigo takes Luka into the basement and closes the door. He has to start a small fire to warm the man up, even though the glow may be spotted if not carefully hidden. Sceps climbs to the upper floor, to overwatch from the darkness beside a window. He will not move for hours, watching and listening for movement outside the building.
“I do not like the livestreams,” Luka says suddenly, his voice cutting through the silence. Rigo stops piling up wooden furniture and looks at him.
“Is that so, bro?” Rigo asks, genuinely interested. Every tourist he has ever met has been obsessed with the livestreams, eager to appear on the more popular guides’ channels or even their own.
When he had been a guide with Sceps and Marten, they had had to smile and nod to the camera for the tourists with drones they escorted into the badlands. The tourists loved their dour expressions, finding them amusing. The change in profession for the three had been a relief. It seems like all guides eventually turn to corpse hunting, when they tire of the hedonism and carnage.
Luka hesitates for a moment, “Yeah, it’s just... I don’t see the point. Everyone is glued to the livestreams, watching people risk their lives. It feels...shallow. Even with the dog tags. Especially, maybe.” He goes quiet, as if thinking in silence about the implications of the dog tags.
“Mmhmm,” Rigo says noncommittedly. Luka seems stuck on this topic. He has seen many tourists get caught up in the excitement of being on camera, forgetting the real dangers around them. Such as himself.
“I used to watch them all the time too,” Luka admits. He seems embarrassed.
Rigo nods but does not respond. He breaks down some of the wooden furniture, using a knife to shave off bits for kindling. He arranges the wood in a rusted metal bucket and lights it with a butane lighter. Soon a flame starts flickering, casting dim shadows on the walls.
The warmth seems a welcome relief for Luka as he tries to soak in the heat next to the fire. The tendrils of smoke escape through a small hole in the ceiling. Rigo hopes that no one outside notices. Sceps should see anyone approaching anyway.
Rigo hands Luka a ration pack. They eat in silence, the crackling of the fire and the howling wind outside are the only sounds.
“The livestreams ruin the safaris,” Luka finally says, as if Rigo had been waiting for him to continue the conversation. “People start doing stupid things. It’s not about surviving or sport anymore; it’s about putting on a show.”
Rigo wonders if Sceps can hear the man from the upper stories. He would agree with Luka. They had seen tourists ignore safety, provoke zombies, and even challenge other hunters, all for the sake of the livestreams. Sceps had tired of it before he or Marten had.
“And the worst part,” Luka continues, “is that it’s never real. People rely on the dog tags bringing them back to life, so everything is exaggerated and hyper-violent. It’s like watching a bad reality vid show. Everyone’s pretending.”
Rigo thinks Luka talks a lot, but he reflects on what he said. He remembers the constant presence of drones buzzing overhead, turning danger into a spectacle. The corporate hunting stands provide a semblance of security for the safari groups. But even there, the pressure from the audience turns every hunt into a show, with people shooting zombies or each other from high perches. Tourists and guides alike take extreme risks, staging elaborate zombie kills, going into dangerous areas, or even challenging each other just to get a spike in viewers.
The parties, too, are a part of the madness. When the cameras are on, the tourists and some guides throw wild, reckless parties, drinking and celebrating in the middle of zombie hordes. The parties often lead to even more reckless behavior as people push the boundaries, trying to create the next viral moment. The constant need for entertainment turns the experience hollow. The livestreams show the crazy of the planet.
Luka’s voice drops to a quieter tone. “I came here because I wanted to see if I could survive. The dog tags are just insurance against the worst happening, not a license to kill.”
Rigo can see the disillusionment in Luka’s eyes, even as the man sits frozen and afraid in the dark basement. He saw the wide-eyed excitement in many tourists but sometimes they reacted like this, he recalls. He can tell when the planet disappoints.
“I get it,” Rigo says. He didn’t think Luka got it, but he was falling back into the role of guide and saying appropriately supportive drivel. “We will try to get you back to Archangelsk.” He knows he will never betray this naïve tourist, even though he won’t let the man know.
Luka smiles wanly at the corpse hunter. “Thank you.”
They sit in silence for some time until they hear gunshots in the distance. Luka jumps and looks around worriedly. Rigo continues to eat his food undisturbed. Sceps will let him know about any danger.
“What was that? Is someone coming?”
Rigo answers him, waving one hand in a vague direction. “Oh, that’s over there, far away to the northeast. They’re calling for us. But it’s too dark to continue. We will go in the morning.”
Luka looks apprehensive. “You want to kill them?” He hesitates for a moment before saying, “I will help.”
“You want to go fight these people? They could be zombie hunters like yourself. Probably are, that far north.”
“I will do whatever you want, destroy zombies or…kill people. As long as you take their tags. I just want to get back to Arkhangelsk.”
“Sorry, we’re not the typical type of guys who go around and destroy zombies, we’re just here for the fights with living people.”
“Yes, you’re corpse hunters.”
“Don’t let Sceps hear you call us that. He gets a bit touchy about it. We prefer retrieval experts.”
“Coming in.” Sceps suddenly speaks outside the door. He enters with a snarl on his lips for Luka. He picks up rations. He apparently heard.
Luka noting Sceps mood says, “Retrieval experts. I got it. Sorry.” Sceps leaves and Luka returns to his food.
Silence drops over the men, but it seems to be too much for Luka to deal with. He speaks again.
“That’s fine, I don’t like the people who go around and mow down zombies from the safety of the stands. It’s kind of annoying; you must wait all the time. Also, with the drones always watching, the tourists do crazy things. They party too much; I don’t like it. That’s why I asked the guide to go further south. I wanted to see the mountains.”
Rigo considers Luka thoughtfully. He had thought the man was a coward, but the German has a certain kind of courage. He is scared, very obviously so, but he hasn’t actually backed down once. Even when the zombies were attacking in the house, he fought back.
The mountains are far away from Arkhangelsk and unseen from the spaceport. The skyscrapers in the city where they found Luka have views of them. Sometimes, they range far south, but it is harder to find dog tags down there. Most of the people who go that way are looking for alien tech. They are usually well-geared and trained. Rigo, Sceps, and Marten must prey on the tourist groups that stay north to earn credits to sustain themselves. They like the mountains though, for the quiet. Sometimes, they get good fights in the mountains, against the people looking for tech or other corpse hunters, which keeps them entertained. They rarely lose.
Luka’s desire to see the mountains, to push beyond the usual boundaries, reveals a different kind of tourist. He appears to want something away from the superficial safaris. The livestreams fade away in the mountains, where Rigo has found moments of peace away from the prying eyes of the drones, even though the violence continues. Rigo’s respect for the odd German tourist grows. The man is not just another thrill-seeker looking for a moment of fame.
Luka’s head nods against his chest as he sits against the corner. He is falling asleep in the warmth as the fire fades. Sceps is still awake above them, but he will need to be relieved in some hours so he can sleep as well. Rigo closes his eyes, his shoulder against the door. Any noise or movement will wake him immediately. He is a light sleeper.
The night wears on, and the cold wind ceases howling outside, but the snow continues to fall. The world is silent and dark. They will continue on in the morning.