Reality status: FUBAR
By
CSquared
(Based on an original idea by Toby)




Chapter 1:
Have you ever had the feeling of not knowing if you’re awake or asleep? You know, dreams that are so realistic that you believe in them, or even the things in real life that feels so fucked up that it feels like you’re dreaming? Something like that was the way Terry Jones felt right now. He just didn't have time to think any further about it, hiding as he was behind an upturned car, while several deadly looking soldiers searched furiously after him.

Terry had never been so scared in all of his 26 years. The soldiers were dressed from head to toe in black tactical suits, and each of them carried an M4A1 automatic rifle. He cringed, leaning against the cold metal of the car's bottom. Suddenly, one of the soldiers stepped past the end of the car. His full-face mask didn't allow for much peripheral vision, which combined with the soldier's apparently poor training probably was the only reason he didn't spot Terry. Terry held his breath, and scuttled around the front of the car as quietly as he could.

Just as he got out of sight from the menacing looking soldier, he stepped on a small stone, or a piece of gravel, which shot out from under the sole hitting the car. The resultant sound alerted the soldier, who span on his heel and advanced toward the place where Terry had stood just moments before. Terry had thrown himself in front of the car and thus avoided being detected, but from his present location he had no more places to go and he knew his was only seconds away from being found. He felt his heartbeat escalate, and he was just about ready to void his bowels when the sound of gunfire reverberated across the empty street. The soldier halted, and ran across to his team-mate, who had fired a few rounds into a bush.

Terry took his chance, and ran as fast as he could for cover. Within three seconds he had covered the 20 feet between the car and the flats on the opposite side of the street. He saw an open window, and dived head-first through it, landing in someone's bedroom. He dropped to the floor and slid himself under the bed.

Back outside the team leader was yelling on the soldier who had fired into the bushes.
"What was that!?"
"What was what, sir?" the soldier seemed slightly confused.
The leader looked around the soldier but could see nothing worth shooting.
"I just thought I heard something, sir" said the soldier, mostly to himself.
"Continue the search!" shouted the team leader as he returned to searching by the car, "I know he's here somewhere."
Inside the bush, the soul of a cat lamented the loss of its ninth life.

Terry lay under the bed for a long time, how long he wasn't sure but finally his heartbeats and breathing had slowed down enough for him to dare to crawl out from under the bed. The flat was silent, eerily so. He turned around in order to climb back out of the window that he came through. As he stuck out his head through the window he was suddenly looking down the wall of a 7 floor building, ending with none-too soft looking concrete. 'What the fuck...?' he thought, feeling the strong wind against his face. There was nothing for it. He was going to have to go through the flat, and hope no-one was home. As he walked to the door the thoughts circled his head. 'How the hell am I supposed to explain this to someone I meet, I don't even understand it myself.'

He stepped from the bedroom into a large room filled with wooden crates. The fact that he had stepped from a bedroom into a warehouse didn't seem to faze him. Shutting the door behind him, he started to search his way between the crates. Half way past the first crate, he got an attack of nerves, span around and started searching for the door, but it wasn't there, all there was were more crates. He started, and gasped. "What the fuck is going on here...?" he muttered, staring at the crate with an unreadable label on it. Shrugging he turned around and continued to search his way through the warehouse. As he neared the far wall, he noticed a multi-coloured light flickering from a doorway further down the corridor he was now walking along. 'Shit! The television is on!' Terry felt his heart start pounding again. He stepped up to the open doorway, and looked through it. The sight that greeted him was not what he had expected. Something that could only be a recently deceased corpse kneeling on top of a fat, middle-aged man who was sitting in an armchair. The corpse was moving, and nothing in its movements revealed that it was supposed to be 6 feet under ground. The corpse was moving in such a way that it looked like it was chewing on the dead mans shoulder.

When Terry had stood in the doorway for only a few seconds trying not to puke, the undead corpse snapped its head up from the dead mans shoulder and sniffed the air. Its face contorted into a cross between a grin and pure horror as it snapped its head around and looked straight at Terry with its milk white eyes. Its blood stained features were that of a man possibly in his mid-thirties, with a black goatee beard. Its mouth hung open revealing the razor sharp teeth, as if the muscles that controlled its jaw had lost all effectiveness. Terry grinned nervously at it, trying not to puke. "I was going to ask if there was anything good on TV, but you're not one for talking much, are you." He joked. By way of response, the undead got up onto its feet and started moving towards Terry. He stood frozen in the doorway feeling like all the nerves to his limbs had decided to take a well deserved rest. When the thing was a few feet away from Terry, it lunged, and knocked Terry onto his back forcing all the air from his lungs. As he felt the hot, stinking, disgusting breath of the thing on his face, Terry's instincts took over. Adrenaline pumped through his veins, and he pushed the thing away from him far enough for him to climb onto his feet. As he ran through the corridor he came from he noticed a white door with a frosted glass window in it. He burst through it to find himself standing in the middle of a kitchen. Slamming the door behind him, he leaned against it to stop the thing from opening it.

The thing was close behind Terry and slammed into the door as Terry closed it. Not one to let things like a door stop it, it pressed up against it and started thumping against the wood with its bony fists. Terry gritted his teeth, looking around desperately for something to jam the door with. It was then that he noticed the table. It looked fairly heavy and could possible hold the thing outside for a while. Looking above his head, he noticed a large bolt lock set into the door. He slid it across, and dashed for the table. Leaning into it, he managed to slide it across the room and against the door.

While the creature continued its steady beating on the door, Terry scoured the room for weapons. He frantically opened drawers and cupboards, to no avail. Not even any cutlery. Trying to tear out the last drawer failed miserably as it ended with Terry sitting on the floor with the handle of the drawer in his hand. He stood up and tried opening it again taking hold of the lower edge of the drawers front. Sod's law, it wouldn't open. He got on one knee to get a closer look. Mortice lock. No chance of picking that. He gave the drawer another pull. It felt pretty solid. Expecting something worthwhile in the drawer Terry desperately tried to find some way of opening it.

Stepping back from the drawer, Terry was distraught. The rest of the unit was solid fronted, not even a cupboard. He couldn't even tear the bottom out of the drawer. Or could he? The rest of the kitchen was made from fairly flimsy chipboard. This should be the same stuff.

Sure enough, Terry's foot smashed straight through the bottom of the drawer. He tore the broken pieces away, and threw them behind him. Suddenly the thing pounding on the door figured out one of the more well known properties of glass. Such as, it's intolerably low breaking point. Reaching under the drawer Terry cleared away the sharp edges around the hole he kicked open, and reached into the drawer from beneath. Touching the heavy piece of metal Terry couldn't believe his luck. He took a grip around it and brought it out into the light. It was a big silver revolver. Out from the hole several bullets had also fallen out. As he figured out how to open the chamber he glanced toward the door and noticed that the thing trying to get through it almost had succeeded, it was hanging with almost all of its upper body through the window. The chamber popped open and Terry saw the six rounds in it. Closing the chamber Terry tried to remember all the action movies he had seen and thought, 'This shouldn't be so hard, aim and shoot right?' Terry laughed nervously to himself.

The thing had finally managed to crawl through the small window and as it stood up it stared right into the barrel of Terry's revolver. Terry jerked the trigger and the bullet slammed into the thing's chest, throwing it flat onto its back. Terry was exhausted, and his right hand and arm hurt like hell from the recoil. Terry stumbled back towards the wall and sank down along it. He started to slowly relax. He was jarred from this state by the creature's head lifting off the clean white tiles. He yelped and randomly fired the gun at it. Catching the thing in the face through sheer luck, he killed it.

'Black suited soldiers, the ground floor suddenly becoming the 80th, this gun... zombies... what the fuck is going on... I can't believe I'm not dreaming...' As he thought this his eyes started to slowly close. Suddenly he was distracted by a shape moving past the window. Without warning, a flashbang grenade came into violent contact with his skull, before detonating. The combination of the two sent him spiralling into unconsciousness.

"We got 'im, sir!" yelled the soldier, across the intercom.

*END OF CHAPTER ONE*
