Note: This story was dynamically reformatted for online reading convenience.
 
 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*