Zombie Apocalypse – What will you do?

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Background

It is that time of the year again and costumed parties are going on all around town. Your friends have asked you out but you have had an insane week at work. All you want to do is lie down and binge watch Stranger Things or the latest episodes of My Only One. As you settle down on your sofa with your favourite snack, you hear sirens ring out in the distance. You ignore them, engrossed in your show.

You wake up with a start. You sit up slowly, groggy from sleep. The TV and lights are still on, but a smell of smoke and fire hangs unpleasantly in the air. ‘Must be the haze again’, you think to yourself.  You stretch and yawn, getting up to close the windows. As you reach for the window, what you are seeing truly hits you. Large plots of darkness punctuate the brightly lit nightscape of Singapore, swallowing the light from surrounding areas and isolating them like islands floating in a deep dark sea. ‘A blackout? Again? What’s going on?’ Orange tinged smoke rises from several locations in the distance, flickering and rising in the night. As you puzzle over the odd sight, you realise that the Public Warning System sirens are blaring.

You stagger back to the sofa, searching for your phone. It is 3:18 in the morning and you have had 15 missed calls, 6 text messages and 361 WhatsApp notifications since you fell asleep. You unlock the phone and check your missed calls. Three calls from relatives, eight from your parents, and four from different friends. You wonder why your parents have called that many times. When you contacted them in the evening, they were enjoying their annual trip to the Cameron Highlands. The text messages are also surprising as you rarely get text messages these days. You scroll through the messages. All of them are from 71250, the number for emergency broadcasts.

This does not sound good. Whatever is going on has been happening since you fell asleep and shows no signs of abating. You call your parents. The call fails to go through. A wave of anxiety strikes you. You scroll through your WhatsApp messages.

It is a jumbled mess. Panicked requests for information, urgent pleas for updates from friends and relatives, desperate pleas for help, and scattered reports of attacks, fires, and riots.

There is one common theme. The attackers appear to be biting their victims and ignoring any damage or wounds inflicted upon them. Unlikely though it seems, there appears to be only one possibility. Zombies.

You call your parents again. A piercing scream rings out through the neighbourhood. You freeze as you desperately try to figure out where it came from. You are unsuccessful with both the call and pinpointing the source of the scream.

You look through the messages again and mull over your options. Stay at home? Seek safety elsewhere? Try and reach your parents? Prepare a bag for a quick escape? Contact your friends to explore options?

You opt for the latter choice. You send several texts and WhatsApp messages to your closest friends. You stare desperately at your phone, willing it to come to life. No replies come in. You try calling. Nothing works. The networks appear to be up but nothing seems to be going or coming through.

Time to Run!

Another scream interrupts the distant alarm of the sirens. It seems closer. Leaving the house sounds terrifying, but being trapped in it sounds worse. You realise that you are going to need weapons, tools and more. You grab a backpack and begin cramming things into it.

Time to arm yourself

After rummaging through a few rooms in the house, you head to the kitchen. You find a number of potential weapons ranging from your mother’s favourite kitchen knife to a claw hammer from the toolbox. Laying them out, you pick up your chosen weapon and heft it in your hand, you are frightened and your heart is pounding out of your chest but it makes you feel a little better knowing that you are armed.