Zhukov and Sergei needn’t move far to spot another landmark. With the dissipation of the blizzard, their field of view had been greatly extended. After a short walk a forest could be seen to the southeast. However there was something very unsettling about it. Despite the sun having completed a fourth of its journey to set in the west, the forest was eerily dark. A much more enjoyable find for them was what appeared to be a small settlement to the north.

“So, let’s head to the forest then shall we?”

“Fuck that.”

Zhukov pulled out a pair of binoculars and looked off towards the settlement, a small village enclosed by a palisade wall. Though he couldn’t see the entire village from his position, Zhukov noted that it was a rather small village. The number of buildings totaled less than twenty, with the largest being a church that towered over the others. The church, in particular, had Zhukov’s attention.

It was a very familiar design, a rectangular construction with a bell tower at the front. However, a tree seemed to have grown straight out of roof near the rear of the church, rising up above the bell tower. Its lush green leaves covered in a layer of snow were a strange sight in the snowy tundra. Even the forest to the southeast had only dull evergreens.

“The hell…”

Zhukov lowered the binoculars to find Sergei staring at him with a questioning look. Rather than explain, Zhukov passed the binoculars to his comrade and let him have a look for himself. Though to his surprise, Sergei didn’t say anything about the tree. Instead he chose to speak about something more concerning.

“I don’t see any smoke…”

“Bah, smoke…what about the giant fucking tree coming straight out of church!”

“Oh, isn’t that odd.”

Zhukov sighed and snatched the binoculars back. He peered back at the village to find that Sergei was right, there was no smoke. It was strange that in a such a cold environment there were no signs of any fires being used for warmth.

“Well, no use sitting around here.”

Zhukov put away the binoculars and started heading for the village, Sergei in tow. The closer they got the more worried they grew. The first thing they noticed were the numerous claw marks that covered the palisade wall. Then there was the entrance, a large wooden gate that had been left open and unguarded. The worst, however, was the eerie silence that went undisturbed even as the two approached.

Zhukov and Sergei entered from the village’s southwest gate, their minds already filled with doubt. They ended up in large empty plaza of sorts with a few empty stalls and abandoned carts. On the opposite side of the village sat the church with the strange tree, its entrance facing them. The church was flanked by buildings on both sides, with unkempt streets between them. The buildings on the left formed a sort of residential district, while the right side seemed to have more industrial oriented buildings, the closest to them being a carpenter’s workshop.

More signs of conflict could also be seen from inside. The houses in the residential district having more claw marks along with broken windows. In the plaza, splotches of blood had frozen solid on one of the stalls, faintly glimmering in the light. However there was not a corpse in sight.

The two walked to the center of the plaza where they found a small tree. Unlike the one sprouting from the church though, this one had died. Before they could investigate any farther, they were interrupted by the sound of a door being kicked open. Zhukov and Sergei turned to face the residential district where they found a moving monstrosity.

“Mother of God…”

“How the hell is it still alive?”

The creature that was before them was a human, or at least it had been. It’s body was covered in claw marks and was missing flesh from multiple limbs. The creature stared at Zhukov and Vasily with a head that had been caved in on one side, leaving an eyeball dangling outside its socket. It twitched a few times before charging them with an unnatural speed, especially for the corpse that it was. The two quickly shook themselves out of their daze and unslung their rifles. The corpse was fast, but it still had a lot of ground to cover. Sergei was first the chamber a round and after switching the firing mode to semi-automatic, he unleashed a torrent of hot lead into the chest of the corpse. Two of his three shots hit, knocking the creature to the ground.

“The fuck was that?”

“Wait look!”

Zhukov redirected Sergei’s attention to the corpse which had begun to raise itself back up. Before it could charge again though, Zhukov placed a round directly into the its head. Brain matter exploded out of the back of its skull and this time, it did not get back up. Sergei wanted to loose a few more rounds just to make sure, but he was stopped by Zhukov, who had placed his hand on his shoulder.

“There are more…”

More undead poured from the residential district. Corpses crawled out of windows, fell down balconies, and shambled out of the shadows. Most of them were in the same battered state as the first, but others were missing anything from a single limb to half of their body. Zhukov and Sergei fired into the crowd, but barely managed to do much more than remove more flesh from the already dead bodies.

“Perhaps now is good time to run!”

Zhukov turned to the gate they came through, only to find that more of the deceased had appeared, blocking it off. Instead of risking a confrontation, he turned back and grabbed Sergei who was still attempting to thin out the crowd of undead. The two ran towards the industrial sector which seemed to be relatively free of the dead. After passing the carpenter’s workshop, the two found themselves next to a large barn. Before they could move past, one of the two large barn doors was kicked off of its hinges and sent crashing into Zhukov. A pair of hands emerged from the shadows, grabbing Sergei and throwing him inside.

Sergei was left stunned after the throw sent him into the wall at the opposite end of the barn. The light pouring in from the entrance revealed his adversary, a German soldier. Or at least he was in life, as now he was nothing more than a moving corpse. On the undead soldier’s head, a hat embedded with with the emblem of the German Reich sat.

Sergei brought himself out of his daze and aimed his rifle at the corpse, only to hear the click notifying him that he was out of ammunition. As the undead broke into a sprint, Sergei grasped his rifle from the front, his left hand which was on the rifle’s heat shield was seared by the still hot barrel. Ignoring the pain he charged and bludgeoned the undead monstrosity in its head with the rifle’s stock, sending it to the ground. He then straddled the corpse as it lied on the ground, delivering blow after blow to its head with the butt of the rifle. He only stopped after what remained of its skull was nothing more than a bloody mush.

After slamming a new magazine into his rifle and switching the firing mode to full automatic, Sergei charged back outside to find Zhukov stuck under the door, wielding only his revolver. Around the old bastard were seven corpses, their heads sporting new holes. Sergei lifted up the door, allowing Zhukov to crawl out from underneath.

“What now? They are blocking us!”

Sergei cried out as he saw the corpses shuffling out of buildings, blocking off the route they had originally planned on taking.

“To the church, go!”

Zhukov shouted out for Sergei to run, but the latter saw that Zhukov was limping and didn’t immediately make a move. Having thought of a better plan, Sergei unloaded his rifle into the legs of the horde that stood between them and the church. Many of undead dropped to the ground and tried to get back up with their ruined legs, only to end up toppling back over. After slamming his last magazine into his rifle, he turned and lent Zhukov his shoulder. The two slipped past the undead who were still struggling to move and headed towards the church.

“Bah, I bet their faces were as ugly in life as they were in death.”

“Pretty wise of you to be cracking jokes about the dead, when you’re on death’s edge yourself”

“Da, save this wise man, perhaps he may shareth his wisdom after we get out of this fucking mess.”

“You know Zhukov, a beard does not make you a philosopher.”

“Eh, fuck you!”

Upon reaching the entrance to the church, Sergei pushed open the heavy metal doors and peered inside. After seeing no obvious dangers, the two entered, shutting the heavy door behind. Sergei left Zhukov leaning against the wall and turned to investigate the church.

It was a rather strange church compared to the ones he’d seen before. There were no pews for sitting, in fact there wasn’t much of anything church like. The entire floor was soil, upon which a field of clovers had grown. A variety of healthy plants were being showered with sunlight that came in from the windows. Where an altar would have normally been there was instead a massive tree trunk. It must have been the base of the tree they had seen from outside. At the front of the trunk sat someone dressed entirely in a black garb, their face concealed with a hood.

“So you’ve co-”

The man attempted to rise while speaking, but was quickly gunned down by Sergei. After a few gasps of pain and surprise there was utter silence. Not even the undead stirred outside.

“You know, I think he was trying to say something.”

“Not anymore.”

Zhukov laughed heartily at his comrade’s response. Sergei approached the man who he had just shot. After confirming that he was no longer breathing, he started to pat the man down. He didn’t find much in the way of valuables, the most interesting find being the man’s journal and the scraps of what appeared to be a map. Though even after skimming through journal, he understood nothing as it was in a completely different language.

The map on the other hand, though it was just the corner of what was once a full piece, was undoubtedly more valuable. Though he still couldn’t read any of the words or symbols. According to the map there was another village to the northeast, along with what appeared to be ruins further to the east. There was also a mark that was a different color than the others to the northwest. It looked like a clock tower and had been added to the map not too long ago, as the ink was still fresh.

Sergei moved away from the corpse and towards the tree trunk. Embedded in the tree was a small greenish-yellow crystal cube, barely bigger than the tip of a thumb.

Back at the entrance, Zhukov, having recovered from the pain that plagued him, moved back to the metal doors. He cracked them open to peer outside after hearing no sounds of the dead trying to break in. Outside the dead stood still as if frozen in time.

“Hey Sergei, come take a look at this!”

The two cautiously crept outside the church, afraid of provoking the dead into attacking them again. They approached the closest corpse that was still standing. It had a gaping hole in its stomach from when it was shot earlier. After seeing no reaction from the creature despite their close proximity, Zhukov had a bright idea. He started to slap the corpse, in its face, repeatedly. Sadly, despite his best efforts to piss off the corpse, nothing happened.

“Is strange, very strange.”

“Haha, perhaps they have accepted us as their overlords!”

“Ha, maybe! Dance for me slave!”

The corpse actually started to do a little jig. Zhukov was stunned that his command actually worked. Sergei on the other hand was smiling with excitement.

“Everybody dance!”

The corpses obeyed breaking out in a lively dance. Even the corpses who were missing legs swung their arms up in the air to show their participation.

“No, no! All wrong!”

Zhukov shook his head at the corpses shameful display. He went into a crouch and began to dance too, kicking his legs out while hopping about. Sergei laughed and joined in. With his back facing the ground, he alternated between using his hands and legs to propel his body back into the air. If he missed even a single beat he would’ve ended up falling on his back. The corpses began to imitate their moves, soon the town of the dead looked like it was participating in a traditional Russian festival. They ended up dancing until the the sun had disappeared, replacing the day with the night.

To their surprise, when night came torches that had been attached to the palisade walls lit up without any assistance. The town was engulfed in a warm pleasant light and the two would have continued dancing with their new compatriots, if it weren’t for the dreadful screeches coming from the forest. Zhukov left Sergei to continue dancing with the dead and went to the church’s bell tower to investigate.

Upon reaching the top he pulled out his binoculars and looked to the southeast, towards the forest. Much to his dismay he couldn’t see much of anything in the dark, still he continued looking.

Moments later the night sky was lit up with gunfire, two planes were dogfighting to the east as they headed north. Though Zhukov’s eyes remained stuck on the tree line, as the flashes of the battle in the air had revealed the source of the screeching on the ground. The creature had only been revealed for a few seconds, yet that was all the time Zhukov had needed to see that it was a horror that shouldn’t have existed. It stood on two muscular legs. With grossly pale skin tinted blue, it had no fur or hair. It’s arms almost touched the ground despite it standing upright, long sharp claws dangling from its hands. Upon its face, a mass of tentacles hung from where its mouth should have been. To Zhukov’s horror, the beast’s red beady eyes were staring straight back at him.