Calm Before the Storm

I fell on my knees as I was starting to breathe heavily…

Everything around me started to slow down…

I felt like I was being choked as if someone was sucking all the air in the room…

Why did this have to happen? Why did he have to sacrifice himself for me?

It's my fault… It's all my fault…

"Paradox! Get a hold of yourself!" A muffled voice called out…

Another memory resurfaced…

"…the things that will happen will not be your fault. We all made our choice to follow you. And if anything happens, we are happy that we get to follow someone like you."

His words were now resurfacing again…

"Paradox?! Paradox!" The voice continued in a muffled sound…

"The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again."

Another memory of his words were now echoing in my head…

Why are these memories coming in just now?

This is definitely my fault…

*PAK!*

A slap went across my face…

My face begun to hurt and I was drawn back to reality. A beautiful face was staring at me with tears in her eyes. I looked around and saw the body of a familiar person lying on the floor.

It was not a dream after all…

"Paradox, he's gone. We have to move on…" Toni said while holding my face.

I looked at the body once again to confirm who it was…

Giga is gone…

I then looked at Toni again. I didn't know what to say or to feel this time.

"I know who Giga was to you before all this happened, and he really did mean a lot to all of us, but I'm sure he didn't throw his life away to see us throw ours." Toni tried to convince me.

Tears were streaming down my eyes like waterfalls. Giga was my loyal butler. But he was also my second father. I remembered because a scene from a locked memory resurfaced.

I won't throw my life away! Not today, we will continue to live. We will fight on behalf of Giga.

"Wh-what are we going to do? We can't just leave him here. He'll turn into one of those things out there." Yan said sounding scared.

"You guys leave. I'll handle this." I told everybody as I stood up.

They understood what I meant, so they didn't leave.

"You don't have to do this boss."

"Yeah boss. We can't leave you to it." The twins tried to console me.

"I said leave. That's an order." I commanded.

Everyone went away and started to drag the bodies of the dead zombies down the stairs, and I was finally left alone with Giga.

I went to closer to his body and knelt down beside him…

"I know you'll say that this is not my fault, but you protected me in the previous jump, and now, you protected me again."

I was now crying again. He actually saved me as if he was destined to die for me.

"…the things that will happen will not be your fault. We all made our choice to follow you. And if anything happens, we are happy that we get to follow someone like you."

"Though your trip was short in this jump, I will miss you."

His body was now twitching…

The first sign of zombification…

His crystal was now slowly cracking …

I slowly pulled out my katana and looked at him one last time…

"Thanks a lot buddy…"

I smiled at him.

*GRRRRAAAAAAH—*

I beheaded him before he could bite me…

The others were looking at me with sad expressions as they paused from what they're doing.

"What?"

They then went back to what they were doing.

I looked at Giga's body before picking it up and dragging it towards the pile of zombies outside. A hand was then placed on my shoulder after I dumped his body to the rest of the pile.

"Are you going to be fine?" Fairy asked.

"I will be. Don't worry about me." I smiled at her.

I won't let anyone else die…

Without me noticing, the crystal on my wrist started to throb. I took a look at it, and to my surprise, it was glowing!

Everyone was now gathering towards me to see what the glowing thing was. A spark then appeared on my hand. It was just for a moment, but I felt like I could control it. I wasn't the only one who experienced something like this. The rest encountered something similar as well. Fairy for example, was able to levitate for a second. Our powers were slowly manifesting. But in our previous jumps, it was after a full month before our powers slowly manifested. This time it was only after a day. Then it hit us. If the good memories feed the crystal, traumatic experiences feed our powers.

That's really messed up! Did we have to go through a lot of awful experiences to have our powers fully manifest?

The thought of it sent chills down my spine.

Then another thought crossed my mind.

Did the timeline also shortened? Does that mean that certain events will draw closer than they should be? This was still a theory, but it was possible.

We then went on to fortify the rest of the front gate as it was the most vulnerable part of the mansion. Some of our teammates parked a couple of armored cars near the front gate just in case we needed to raid or escape. It was already armored up when we found it. This was probably prepared by us when we were preparing things. We parked them in a weird way to allow the horde to be diverted into smaller groups.

You see, the decays are way different from what you expect zombies to be. They are blind and are directed by three things: the smell of human blood, loud noises and extreme body heat. Large encampments were a bad idea in this apocalypse since a group of people would produce extreme body heat attracting a large wave of fast-paced zombies.

One thing that we found out about the decay is that even though they know where the direction of their prey is, they would mindlessly walk towards it. Meaning, if they encounter a wall they would turn around until they would find a way over that obstacle. They won't crawl or climb over these obstacles. It's something like water being directed towards its goal. Having this knowledge, we parked the cars creating a small maze in the courtyard so their pathways were narrowed and we can focus fire with just one or two zombies.

We fortified the front gates with spare metal that we found at the garage. This was to make sure that zombies would not break into it. We weren't afraid since zombies don't know how to climb and would just bump on the objects. Since the decay were attracted to a crowd of people so, we encountered a lot of those in the past few days.

Two weeks have already passed since the start of the apocalypse. We had encountered a small group of fast-paced zombie in the past few days. The groups are getting bigger and bigger now. We were starting to get worried because we had no idea on how long the fortified gate can hold off. Once it breaks down, we have to fight against about 3000 fast-paced zombies.

"We can't hold on for much longer…" Toni said to me while staring at the horde of zombies.

We were now standing on the balcony of the mansion. Facing the 3000 plus zombies, we were not sure as to when we can hold it off with our current fortification.

"We have to stay and wait for our comrades." I said

That's what I heard from my message. But right now, I'm not sure if that plan would still come to pass. In the past few days, we noticed a lot of changes. Some of us were already manifesting our powers while others were still awakening. Last week, Kaizer could summon 10 knives out of nowhere. He spent the last few days training with these knives and as well as how to summon and unsummon them. Yesterday, he was able to make the move with his mind, but that was only for a few seconds.

Based on these observations, the timeline is progressing faster than it should have. This was probably the reason why we were awakening earlier than expected. Would that mean that this was the calamity that my past self was talking about? The 3000+ zombies were really terrifying. If this was the calamity, then would my comrades also come earlier than expected or wouldn't they be able to make it because the timeline sped up?

Knowing this, panic was slowly building up. If the answer to these theories would what I think they'd be, then the entire plan would be ruined. I would need to improvise. And I'm definitely not good with that.

"If I remember correctly there was an escape plan for next year."

Everyone then looked at me with a face that says 'how in the world could say that now?'

"I know what you guys are thinking, but I wasn't sure if this would work. My past self told me to wait for our teammates. To make matters worse, he didn't say who. He also said that this comrade or these comrades had a huge part to play in the upcoming calamity."

They then looked at the horde and became silent.

"We just have to wait for them then." The Twins said.

"But I don't want us to sit around and do nothing." I told them.

"Then what do you propose we do?" Fairy asked.

"We find our escape." I smirked as I said that.

"What escape?" Jaden asked.

I turned around and took two steps away from the group…

"A super-powered jet…" I slowly walked away as I said that.

"Are you crazy?! We explored the entire place. There isn't such a thing!" Kaizer retorted.

I then stopped and turned my head towards them

"We explored what we see, not what we couldn't see." I said then I continued to walk inside the mansion.

They then followed me towards the tennis court located behind the mansion. I walked around trying to remember where it was hidden.

"Nothing here…" Nine said in flat tone.

"See? I told you. There's nothing here. Now let's go back and think of a plan to counter a horde of decays." Kaizer complained

Everyone started heading back to the mansion but I stayed behind. Somehow, I felt like the tool shed was calling on to me. I headed towards the tool shed and opened it to look and see if any memory resurfaces. Unfortunately, there were none. I then tried to switch on the lights but it didn't work.

Odd...

Beside the light switch was what seemed to be a fuse box. I then opened it to try and find the switch for the lights.

There were a lot of switches to connect the electricity. As I was reading through the labels of each switch, I then noticed a switch with a weird label. It read "Flugzeug". Well, I'm no expert in names but I was guessing that this was german. I then remembered what it meant and it got me excited! I flipped the switch and the ground began to shake.

My friends then started rushing over to where I was. They must've thought that something was wrong because they were coming over with their weapons.

"What in the world is going on?!" Kaizer exclaimed while he was rushing towards the shack.

They stopped as the ground below them start to open. They then retreated back to there were no cracks. The middle of the tennis court was now completely open and something was coming out of it.

We finally found the Jet!

It was below the tennis court after all!

I must've studied German in my previous life since I could understand what Flugzeug means. It was airplane.

"Wow!" The twins marveled in unison

"Well guys, here's our escape."

Now that we solved our escape problem, we were now focused on continuing to fortify our gates until our teammates come. We then used whatever metal we had found in the underground bunker to solidify the gates. Another week had passed before two layers of the metal fortress were now destroyed by the horde of zombies bashing outside the mansion gates. Only one layer remains and there were no signs of any comrades arriving. The number of decays that were grouping together have now reached 10,000. It was becoming more impossible to hold them of everyday.

"Maybe they don't want to come because of the horde." Nine said.

I didn't refute that argument since it was a possibility as well. But they could have sent us a sign or something.

Something that would allow us to know that they were near.

Sounds of growling and scratching were now louder than ever. And the sounds might have attracted more zombies every minute.

"Boss, we have to leave." Shadow said.

"We don't know how much longer the barrier will hold." Shine also explained.

I was now conflicted…

I can't risk everyone's lives here just for people whom we were not sure if they are indeed coming.

The leader must decide now.

"Everyone, listen, I have a plan. I'll fly the plane over to the right side of the mountain. Shine, Shadow, you guys guard the gates until I tell you to come back to the balcony."

The twins then rushed towards the last layer of the barricade to strengthen it with whatever was left.

"The rest of you, start building a bridge to where I'm going to park the plane. I'll then come and help you build from my end."

Nobody went against the plan. It was the best plan we have right now. It took as 4 hours to complete everything. The gates were beginning to crack and we no longer have any metal left to cover them. I then called everyone to the balcony where we made a staircase leading to the mountain side. The plane was already there, we loaded it with the necessities for the escape.

We were now huddled at the balcony as we could now hear growling from the fast-paced zombies who were forcefully banging the metal barricade on the gate. It was now about to fall off.

Shadow and Shine were now at the balcony… Let's begin…

"We'll make our final stand here. We'll fight until these decays reach the door in the first floor. If that happens, run as fast as you can to the plane."

"Nine, Fairy, you guys have the best accuracy among all of us. You guys head on to the mountains and make it rain. If we rush towards the plane, cover us."

"Did I make myself clear?"

"Clear!" everyone yelled in unison.

"No one dies tonight! NO ONE!" I ordered.

We then rushed towards our positions as we waited for the barricade to topple over. I was now breathing fast as panic begins to rise. Looking at the gates, it wouldn't be long now before it completely falls down and there was still no sign of any teammate. I could feel my heart beat fast.

I felt a gentle touch on my hand. A beautiful smile was now shown to me.

"It'll be fine…" Toni assured me.

Courage was now welling up inside me. I faced the horde of zombies. There was one thing that filled my mind then.

We'll wait for our comrades for us long as we can so they'd better be here.

The sound of a metal hitting the ground rang throughout the courtyard.

The zombies were now rushing towards the mansion where the smell of live meat was from.

I then looked at my teammates one more time as they looked at me with a smile.

I was now assured…

"Give them hell team!"

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