User blog:Tesla Man/The Walking Wiki: Hysteria - Episode 1



“Fuck.” Lexi ran the corner down the sidewalk, a backpack slung over her shoulder as her bare feet scraped against the pavement. She turned into an alleyway and launched the backpack over a fence, jumping up to a metal beam and rolling over the fence, landing harshly on a worn down mattress parallel to her backpack.

She took a massive breath and rubbed the back of her head. The alleyway was dark, the shadow of the hotel buildings cast over it and loose paper had collected in piles along the walls of the buildings.

The clicking of teeth snapped at her ears and the clawing of raw fingertips at the fence as the chained metal bowed at the force of the infected pressing against it.

She rolled off the mattress and onto the dirt encrusted pavement, and got up to her feet and hobbled over to a doorframe dragging her backpack by her side. Her feet left a trail of blood that made the bite and click their teeth together more rapidly.

“Open the fucking door Axel.” She slapped her fist against the metal door and bent over to take a breath. After a few seconds of no response and more creaking of the metal fence, she slammed he fist against the door a second time, immediately opened by Tiger.

Tiger pulled her in and brought the backpack in, throwing it on one of the mattresses in the lobby. The Angel Hotels were a below average place of residence, with a stained velvet floor and a wooden desk at the front, it made a moderately average place for the group to survive as well.

“Sorry, Axel’s in the office, Alexis was acting up again.” Tiger cleared his throat, and opened up the backpack, pulling out a few cans and a bag of flour, setting it on the reception desk. He fell backwards onto his mattress in the middle of the lobby and lit a cigarette, flicking his lighter a few times to get it to ignite.

She walked into the office, Axel, an older man with a baby in his arms was sitting on a couch in the office, bouncing the baby gently to calm it down, and it seemed to have worked.

Lexi smiled and waved a blue baby blanket in the air, and Axel sat the baby down in its ‘nest’ on the couch and walked over to Lexi.

“What the hell did you do that for?” Axel shook his head.

“Do what?” Lexi looked at the blanket. “Try and help Alexis?”

“Risking your life.” Axel took the blanket from her and draped it over the baby. “We don’t have any weapons. You were just supposed to run down the street and grab some food.” Axel smiled at the baby who was going to sleep. “I appreciate the gesture, but where did you go to get it?”

“It was on the floor beside the food.” Lexi smiled, hiding the fact she found it in a bloodied crib in a shopping market half a mile across town. She had hoped it was the infected, she did, but something gnawing at her stomach told her it was one of the unprepared people rampaging a shopping market the day Martial Law went into effect.

“Did you attract the press?” Axel sat back down on the couch.

“Got a couple outside of the fence, we might need to clean them out soon.” Lexi was referencing the infected outside the gate.

“We’ll do that later, right now we’ve been having some trouble on the stairs.” Axel nodded her out of the room. “Jose and Joe!” He raised his voice slightly to not wake Alexis. “You should go now.” He said when the two men entered.

Jose was Hispanic and 19, he lived in the hotel building before the infection. Joe on the other hand was Canadian, and moved down when the situation in Toronto got bad.

“Did you guys make anything?” Lexi walked out of the office with Joe and Jose and Tiger walked over with a piece of wood with nails through it.

“This’ll do.” She twirled the sharp object around in her hand. “You coming with us Tiger?”

“Nah, I’ve gotta keep boarding up the openings.” Tiger left the group and started hammering nails into the door with a solid piece of wood.

“Alright, you ready?” Joe lifted up the plank and the three walked past a line of elevators into the stairs and they began moving stacks of furniture from the stairway opening, and slowly but surely, light peeked onto the staircase.

The growling of the infected echoes through the holes being created in the pile, and soon, there was only a bookshelf left, and Joe and Lexi grabbed each end and lifted, quickly pulling it off of the step and four infect fell down the staircase, and Jose started swinging with the plank.

First swing,

The first infected topped backwards, and the other one stepped forward.

Second swing, The second infected opened its jaw and Jose swung upward, the nail lodging itself through the loose flesh of the bottom of its mouth but it kept growling.

Third swing,

Jose swung the plank with the second infected still connected into another, bashing its head in.

Fourth swing,

Fifth swing.

Sixth swung.

Seventh swing.

Over and over, Jose kept swinging the connected head, to the point where the skull was crushed, effectively killing the two he was wrestling with.

The last one was taken out by Lexi with a solid bash to the head and the plank splintered into the head, and she kicked the body off of the broken wood and stomped its face in.

Tiger swung the block of wood one more time, drilling the last board he had into place. The windows were completely reinforced, but he needed more, he saw what the hordes outside were capable of and he needed to ensure baby Alexis’ safety.

He ran to the back, he heard the group whacking at the infected in the next room over through the elevator hallway and walked into a staff only hallway. He opened the first door and found a bunch of plastic and metal furniture: no good.

He closed the door and moved on, finding a room full of cardboard boxes, of cleaning supplies, and right before the door at the end of the hallway, a room labeled, ‘security’.

It was his last shot at finding some planks of wood so he took it, and after one or two pushes at the door, he couldn’t open in, the inside of the door remained locked. He ran out of the hallway, past the elevators where it sounded like Lexi, Jose, and Joe were having a good time, and into the office.

“Hey Axel, can I get your help with something?” He asked, and Axel left the sleeping baby and followed.

The two worked at the security door, ramming it over and over until their shoulders gave out.

“You think there’s a key in the office?” Tiger took a deep breath.

“No, we checked.” Axel rubbed his shoulder.

The group had only been occupying the building for a little while, arriving only five hours or so, but they wasted no time rummaging through the drawers of desks and cabinets.

“Well damn.” Tiger took a quick glance at the door, noticing a small space between the doorframe and the door. “Well damn.” He repeated again and grabbed the handle and pushed, but it didn’t move. “Something’s wedged up against the door.”

“Then let’s give one more shot at trying to get it out of the way.” Axel was determined.

He raised his foot and kicked with all his power, reeling back once he had made contact with the door, popping his knee. Something large fell over inside and the door eased open, soft light gleaming into the room for the first time in what seemed like forever.

There was a carcass laying on the floor, but only its back, the rest was missing, torn from the skin of its back leaving just an empty shell of scattered bones. On top of it was another body, in a crouching position, clicking its teeth, slowly rocking back and forth in spasmodic bursts.

As soon as the door opened, its head shot to the side, facing the door. It was in a blue security uniform, its hat still loosely on its head.

It stood up, its right leg was broken and the shin bent like a second joint as it stepped forward. It fell to the ground and begin crawling, making a gurgling noise in the back of its throat, sounding like two voices.

Tiger backed up and started shaking and in shock. Axel didn’t know what to do either, he had never dealt with or seen anybody deal with one of these things before.

It got close to Tiger, and Tiger didn’t move. The thing made it out the doorframe, only a foot from Tiger. Its teeth clicking got more rapid as it drew closer, and Axel panicked, grabbing the door handle and slamming the door closed, pushing aside the chair that once barricaded the door closed and smashing the wood on the infected’s head.

With one quick swing of the door the infected’s head was smashed between door and doorframe. Axel dropped to his knees and began gagging as Tiger escaped his coma-like state and stepped into the room, over the infected’s body and into the dark once he noticed something.

The eaten carcass was being lit up by a faint gray glow, its source unknown to Tiger until he stepped into the door.

In the security room were several monitors, displaying the hotel building in black and white in the dark room. But only one was active, the others out, most likely due to the lack of power in the building.

The powered monitor flickered, its image buzzed and blinked, but clearly displayed a dark room, a bed with a radiator, and a man facing the corner. The gentle and faint sound of crying came from a headset, and no doubt came from the man, who looked elderly from the low quality video, and was in a wheelchair.

Tiger began crying, tears rolled down his eyes to see this man suffering, but was cut short from Lexi and Joe walking up to the two.

“Holy shit.” Lexi covered her mouth a retreated a step back after looking at the two bodies.

“Where’s…” Axel was still on his hands and knees coughing. “Where’s Jose?”

“He’s finishing up the last infected on the stairs. Once he’s done, we won’t be needing much of the furniture we used to block up the doors, you can use that to board up your windows Tiger.” She trailed off seeing Tiger crying at the desk. “Tiger.”

“You guys.” He took a deep breath “Come look.”



He wiped the sweat from his forehead and took a deep breath before taking his first steps up the stairs. He got to the turn in the stairs and set his plank with the nail on the step and kept walking up just to take a peek at the upper floor.

What he saw was astonishing.

“There’s a security room, there’s a man locked up, in a few minutes we’re gonna go up the fire escape and start searching.” Lexi grabbed a granola bar from the desk.

“Count of three.” Lexi said, taking a deep breath.

“One.”

The group was ready and determined.

“Two.”

Their pipe clubs held firmly in their hand.

“Three.”

Their feet launched from the hotel and out the door.