The world did not end with a bang, but rather through a series of silent collapses. One by one, the power grids went dark. Satellites blinked out of orbit. Oceans swallowed coastlines. Governments fractured and then vanished. Humanity didn't die in a blaze; it eroded.
Su Wu opened his eyes to the hum of machinery. Cold air seeped into his bones. The concrete walls, rust-streaked pipes, and blinking LEDs confirmed that the bunker was real. So was the pain in his skull.
He was lying on a metal slab, dressed in torn utility overalls. His head throbbed, and a digital interface flickered in his vision.
He sat up, coughing. The air tasted metallic and stale. Dust floated in the faint shafts of light coming through the ceiling vents.
"What the hell is this... a dream?" he muttered.
The system responded.
Memories surfaced—only fragments. He remembered the collapse, the news feeds, and the panicked faces. And then... nothing. Until now.
The room was small. There was one steel door, a broken monitor on the wall, and a table with three objects: a cracked radio, a handheld scanner, and a folded map.
Su Wu grabbed the map first. It showed the facility layout: Bunker Level A-1. There were five sublevels beneath, most of which were labeled "RED"—inaccessible.
He checked the scanner. It blinked with faint readings of movement outside the bunker—dozens of signatures. Unidentified. Probably not human.
Su Wu moved quickly. Every second, the oxygen ticked down, and death crept closer.
He pried open the maintenance panel near the door. The circuits were scorched. He needed parts—tools—anything. He tore the radio apart, salvaged wires, and used a piece of the scanner casing to bridge the power bus. The console sparked.
Lights flickered on. The system chimed:
"Experience points?"
A branching web appeared in his HUD. Each node represented systems—electrical, structural, weapons, agriculture. Everything required resources. Everything cost time.
He had neither.
Minutes later, he was crawling through the vent shaft with a torch in hand. The filters were rotted, and the vents were wide open. No wonder the system warned about contamination. He sealed what he could, jammed scrap metal over the worst gaps, and welded it shut.
Back in the main room, the oxygen level increased. 39 hours remaining.
Still not enough.
Next: water.
He descended a ladder to Sublevel A-2. It was dark and flooded ankle-deep. The recycling unit sat like a corpse in the corner. Su Wu waded to it and cracked it open. The filters were clogged with bio-gunk. He retched but scraped them clean with his bare hands.
A loud clang echoed.
He froze.
Movement in the water.
He drew the broken scanner—it barely functioned as a club—and turned slowly. Shadows rippled. A pale figure surged from the dark.
Instinct took over. He swung.
The scanner smashed into wet flesh. The figure screeched and fell back—a humanoid, gray-skinned and twisted. Not quite a mutant, not quite human.
He ran. Up the ladder. Sealed the hatch.
Breathing hard, he patched the recycling unit and rebooted it.
The system pinged again.
Su Wu stared at the readout.
He was no longer alone.
He wasn't just rebuilding a shelter—he was fortifying the last hope of humanity.
And something out there wanted in.