Chapter Text
David recognized every corpse he walked past.
A 20-year-old college student lay buried beneath the remains of an apartment complex, an ocean of red seeping from the rubble. A mother of two sat charred and unmoving in the burning wreck of a car, still aflame after all these years. An office worker just shy of retirement was impaled on a spike tall as a streetlight. Each time he passed by, they would rise from the dead and follow behind David as a crowd of zombies—never attacking, never speaking, only watching. The many apologies he gave them had no effect.
David walked through the ruined city of Robloxia, more corpses joining him as he did. The crowd had become a small army—hundreds of people trailing behind him. Hundreds of lives that had been cut short by his actions. The destruction only grew worse the farther he went, with spikes protruding from every surface and entire buildings being corroded by red energy. Those unlucky enough to touch the corruption were either horribly scarred or completely melted. David bitterly noted how he had indirectly destroyed the city he had sworn to protect.
Eventually, he saw his destination in the distance—and then, without realizing how, he was suddenly there, standing on the lawn of the Doe household. The modest house was the only untouched part of the city, a perfect picture of the ideal home: white picket fence, a porch built by hand, and a small collection of pink roses planted in the front. It would have been perfect—if not for the dead man slumped on the porch.
John Doe sat motionless in one of the two chairs, eyes closed, hands folded in his lap. This wasn’t the feral, corrupted beast he had become on that day; he was simply a man with a kindly face and glasses, wearing the standard issue Roblox employee uniform. There was no blood, no wounds. David could have mistaken him for being asleep, had he not been the one to kill him. Jane Doe sat in the chair next to her husband, holding his hand and looking content. She looked at David, and for a moment he thought this dream might go differently, that she might forgive him. Then her face contorted in anger, and he felt silly for ever thinking so.
“You did this,” she said, her voice piercing through his skull like a knife.
“I know,” David said, but no sound came out.
“You killed him.” Tears streamed from her eyes, flowing upward into the sky, though David barely registered this.
“I’m sorry.” He spoke again to no avail. He took a step forward—to comfort her, to make things right, to do anything. The instant he moved, the army of corpses reached out and stopped him, hundreds of cold, dead hands holding him still with impossible strength.
“ALL YOU HAD TO DO WAS LISTEN!” Jane screamed. Her voice was loud enough to send cracks spider-webbing across the ground, stopping just before David’s feet. “It should have been you,” she added quietly, and he could only nod in response.
A hand burst from one of the cracks—clawed, long, and razor-sharp, its surface rough like obsidian. A second hand followed, and John Doe pulled himself out of the ground. This wasn’t the man on the porch but the monster he had become that day: larger than life and towering over the bound David. The black corruption had spread through his body like an infection, turning his veins black and coating both his arms from the elbows down. Part of his face was consumed as well, and his right eye glowed red with malice.
David lowered his head beneath his helmet, unable to look at the creature he had created. The beast fixed its horrible gaze upon him, and the silence that followed was almost worse than any injury it could inflict. Finally, in what felt like an act of mercy, the creature lifted David with one hand and thrust its claws through his chest with the other. The pain only lasted a few moments before giving way to sweet, merciful nothingness.