A three‑vehicle pile‑up on a lonely stretch of rural road. Rusted metal. Shattered glass. Moss creeping over crumpled bonnets. The crash is clearly months — maybe years — old, but the scene feels freshly disturbed.
One car door hangs open, swaying in the wind. A suitcase lies spilled across the asphalt, its contents bleached by sun and rain. A mobile phone sits on the ground, screen cracked, long dead.
Amid the wreckage, a woman wanders in slow, looping patterns. She moves as if waking from a nightmare she can’t quite remember.
Susan appears between the vehicles, wearing tattered office clothes stained with dirt and dried blood. Bite marks mar her arms and neck. Her hair is matted, her eyes vacant and bloodshot.
She doesn’t notice the survivors at first. She’s focused on the wreckage, touching the twisted metal with trembling fingers.
“Where… where is everyone?” she murmurs, voice hoarse. “I just… I just need to get home.”
She steps over a long‑dead body without reacting, as if she can’t see it.
Her movements are slow, drifting, dreamlike — until they aren’t.
When Susan finally notices the survivors, her expression shifts — not to anger, but to fear.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispers. “You’re trying to stop me. I know you are.”
She backs away, then lurches forward, indecisive, caught between instinct and memory.
“I have to get to the cabin,” she insists. “My family… they’re waiting. You’re in the way.”
Her fragmented mind interprets any movement as a threat. Any hesitation as hostility. Any approach as an attack.
She clutches at the air as if reaching for a seatbelt that isn’t there.
“Don’t make me do this,” she pleads. “I have to survive.”
Her logic is broken, but her fear is real.
Susan’s body twitches — a sudden, jerky spasm that snaps her into motion.
She moves toward the survivors with halting, uneven steps, her breath rattling in her throat. A faint gurgling moan escapes her lips, growing louder as she becomes more agitated.
“You’re going to hurt me,” she says, voice rising. “I can’t let you. I can’t.”
She reaches for them with trembling hands, not out of malice but out of a desperate, instinctive need to eliminate what she perceives as danger.
If the survivors retreat, she follows. If they speak, she flinches. If they stand still, she circles them like a frightened animal.
Her aggression is not calculated — it is reflexive, born from the moment she died and never left.
The crash site tells Susan’s story long before she does:
A smashed phone with a half‑typed message: “On my way. Bitten. Don’t panic.”
A blood‑stained office badge lying near the wreckage
A family photo cracked under shattered glass
Tyre marks showing a desperate swerve
A broken road sign pointing toward a cabin trailhead
Three vehicles arranged in a way that suggests panic, not malice
The world has moved on. Susan has not.
Susan’s speech is fragmented, fearful, and rooted in the moment of the crash.
Sample lines:
“I just need to get home.”
“Why won’t you let me pass?”
“They’re waiting for me… I think.”
“Stay back. Please. Please.”
“This just happened. I remember the sound.”
“You’re lying. You’re trying to stop me.”
Her voice should feel like someone arguing with a nightmare.
Players can notice the age of the wreckage, the bite marks, the signs of long‑dried blood.
Talking may briefly confuse or delay her, but cannot break the delusion.
Backing away or giving her space may reduce immediate danger.
Possible, but the wreckage creates tight spaces and blind corners.
Violence is possible, but should feel like ending a loop she can’t escape.