Whilst All Things Zombie is our go-to zombie game of choice we thought we’d give Iron Ivan’s No More Room in Hell a whirl as part of our Salute-n-zombies-athon. We played the scenario, The Road, for which, as per a previous post, the roads were made specifically for.
Iron Ivan Games put out some pretty solid rule sets with a dedicated fan-base and a quick flick through Matt’s copy of NMRIH lead me to think we were onto a good thing. After all, it’s just the zombie apocalypse...we know what we’re doing right? I mean...Dr Pepper and all that!?... Maybe?
Here’s what happened.
Outbreak City Outskirts: Dawn
The LED sign looked a little out of place in the stillness of the early morning on the I24 out of Outbreak City.
‘INCIDENT: STAY IN YOUR VEHICLE.’
Nothing moved, but the air was heady with a sickly odor you could taste. From the looks of the carnage of haphazardly abandoned vehicles that littered the interstate nobody had paid much attention. Empty cars covered the freeway as far as they could see in the dull light. Trucks, sedans and utility vehicles blocked every route through, at least for anyone not on foot. A few anxious or impatient drivers had ignored the road and skirted around on the soft verges, but it had been no use. Those that tried had mired in the soft mud and marshy ground that bordered the road on both sides. There was a few feet of solid ground either side of the road but otherwise it might as well have been the bayou.
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| The Road: Scenario Set up. |
“Looks like we walk from here.” said Ken as he cut the engine of the pick-up. They would have taken the Hummer, but there were nine of them and there was a little more room in the back.
“Fine by me.” said Jed who, quite literally, rode shotgun.
“You good to do this Dennis? They’re counting on you.” Ken addressed the other passenger in the front of the truck, a man with a shock of red hair who nervously opened the door.
“They need to get out of here. And so do I.” Dennis replied without looking Ken in the eye.
“Is he gonna be ok?” asked Jed as Dennis wandered away patting his thighs repeatedly.
“We’ll see.” said Ken.
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| The Road. |
The people in the back of the truck were a rag-tag band of some of the least likely survivors from the office block. It appeared that they were from some kind of community social group that met in a building across from the office they had holed up in the past few nights. Dennis was their group leader. Ken wasn’t so happy about having them along, he wasn’t sure they would be able to keep up. Thankfully they were all armed, mostly with improvised weapons and small calibre pistols for home defence, but it was something.
Jed flipped the tailgate and slapped the rear-most passenger on the shoulder. “Let’s go.”
The passengers gingerly dropped down from the truck. They all looked to Dennis, who forced a brief smile and went back to a ritualistic rubbing of hands and drawing and replacing the automatic pistol in the waistband of his jogging pants.
“Keep this with you and keep it on.” said Ken. He twisted the switch on a walkie-talkie and handed it to Dennis. “It’s push to talk.”
“I know how to use it.” snapped Dennis, as he looked up at Ken’s stoic grimace and into his stone cold stare. Dennis’ shoulders sagged. “Thank you, officer.”
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| Incident: Stay In Your Vehicle. |
One hundred yards on they caught sight of a shambling figure that stepped out from behind a truck, it was clear he was one of them. Ken turned to the crowd. “Stay calm. Let’s see if we can keep our distance and skirt around them.”
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| "Let's see if we can skirt around them." |
A deafening yell split the quiet – half scream of terror, half martial battle cry. Dennis rushed forward towards the walker and blazed away with his pistol. He emptied the magazine before anyone could react and every shot went wild or ploughed harmlessly through the walking cadaver. He reached the walker moments later as the slide on his pistol locked back, empty, and the thing lunged at him.
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| A deafening yell split the quiet. |
Jed pushed two anxious looking survivors back behind a delivery truck. With an awkwardly slow movement Dennis twisted as it loomed in on him, broken teeth gnashing after limbs as he clumsily executed a martial arts manoeuvre devoid of any elegance or control. Everyone looked on in stunned silence as, somehow, he picked up his assailant and planted him squarely on its head, snapping the neck in the process.
“Are you trying to draw them all to us? We...” Ken didn’t finish. They swarmed out of nowhere, appearing on every side. “Up there, now!” he yelled, pointing to the tailgate of a utility truck in front.
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| "Up there, now!" |
Dennis wasted no time and clambered into the back of the dumpster. Ken and the others scrambled after him.
Jed saw that the commotion Dennis had caused drew the walkers away from him and the two kids he was with. “Wait here a second.” He said creeping towards a sports coupé.
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| "Wait here a second." |
As they clattered around in the back of the dumpster the moans of the recently deceased increased as they clamoured at the metal walls of the container. “That way.” said Ken, pointing at a Mini Cooper with its front end in the back of a bus. Dennis sprang up and jumped the gap awkwardly, followed closely by Ken and a man who looked like a college professor.
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| The dead closed in. |
Behind them one of Dennis’ other companions lost his footing and slipped off the roof of the cab. He landed, feet first but the drop sent a jolt through his body. “Sam!” yelled a thuggish youth in the back of the container. The professor yelled for Ken to help but he ignored the horde grasping at him. They dragged him kicking and screaming off the bonnet and fell on him like a pack of hungry dogs.
Within seconds Sam was surrounded but somehow, with handgun and fists, he fought them off.
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| With handgun and fists, Sam fought the zombies off. |
Seeing the undead swarm Sam’s way, the thug took his chance. He hopped over the side of the container and dashed for the Mini. But he’d misjudged how many of them there were and was quickly surrounded. They took him down in seconds.
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| He took his chance, with horrfying consequences. |
A pretty girl in a tight vest took a different route and made it to the mini just as they Ken climbed onto the roof of the bus.
Dennis fired into the crowd, close enough to have hit her if she’d still been alive.
“Cease fire and keep moving!” shouted Ken, pushing him on. At the end of the bus they stalled. The next jump, over to the roof of a construction vehicle, looked a little too wide and besides...there was so many of them.
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| There were so many of them. |
The two kids beside Jed clambered onto the sports coupé. Two of the walkers put on a burst of speed and rushed them, arms flailing and teeth bared. The girl hopped out of their reach onto to roof but the other poor kid didn’t stand a chance. He was slammed into the hood with such force Jed figured he must have been dead before they sunk their teeth into him.
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| Dead before they sunk thier teeth into him. |
“Steve!” shrieked the girl reaching after him.
“No, don’t!” Jed shouted. He watched in slow motion as the girl reached down to her boyfriend. One of the walkers turned to her, lashing out at her as the other fed on the boy.
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| Jed wet himself. |
There was no way she was going to match its ferocity. He felt a rush of warmth and wetness in his pants and his hands started to shake. He couldn’t get a clear shot and watched helplessly as she slid off the roof of the car and into its arms and jaws. He backed off and slammed into the delivery truck behind him. It was happening again, just like when they got Emmett.
He closed his eyes and pulled his gaze away. When he looked again, more of those creatures were closing in. He turned and clawed at some hand and footholds on the side of the truck. Up on the roof he looked down on the scene.
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| Jed pissed his pants...again. |
He saw Ken and Dennis a way off, standing at the far end of the bus. Behind them Sam fought his way through a multitude of those things and the pretty girl was struggled to climb onto the bus as a swarm of undead swept in on both of them, he watched the girl slip and slide as more hands reached up and dragged her off the roof into their midst as Sam disappeared under a heaving crowd of flailing limbs in a mist of arterial spray.
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| The poor girl didn't stand a chance. |
Jed shook like a clockwork toy. “K...K..Ken.” He stammered, his voice caught in a dry throat. There was no way they would hear him over the shrieks of the dead and the screams of the dying. He had no idea how he was going to get out of this. For the second time in the space of a few moments he felt a warm trickle flow down his leg.
To be continued...
