>>396
Those dismembered, bloodthirsty body parts are certainly a threat. But they are the evil you know - you are well aware how dangerous they are, whereas the potential danger of the unknown is unbounded. However dire your current situation, surely it is, on average, better to spend your time anticipating the less obvious perils. Like toxoplasmosis.
As you know, this insidious breed of parasite tries to infiltrate you using cute, unassuming cats as Trojan horses (Trojan cats?) and attacks from within. It is often entirely asymptomatic, but believed by many to subtly affect cognition, increasing likelihood of a plethora of mental disorders. How devious! Really, you decide, this simply must be your first priority.
A cold, clammy, but all too active hand grasps your ankle, while you are busy trying to think back to your last instance of cat exposure. It must've been back at >>277 when you spent the night intimately close to Ariadne and Theodore. Oh no, Ariadne is in danger as well! Does this feline treachery know no bounds‽ You get ready to perform a quick PCR to check, but find that when you weren't looking you've been overwhelmed by partial undead. Each of your limbs is pinned down or otherwise incapacitated, and a severed leg is crushing your windpipe, slowly suffocating you.
Ariadne, avoiding one or two swipes herself, bravely charges in and kicks the offending leg from you, before tripping over herself and disappearing in a mound of quivering flesh. You breathe a sigh of relief, but at that moment a disembodied head leaps in, bites into your neck and tears your throat out. You promptly bleed to death.
GAME OVER
Deaths: 13
(Continuing from most recent saved game: >>395)
>>397
You shan't be taken by surprise! You stand up, emptying your mind of distractions in preparation for the oncoming battle. You shall become as intangible to your enemies as a wraith, and as flexible as bamboo. The limbs dumbly throw themselves at you, with no real tactics, and you are able to easily hold them at bay with quick jabs of your knife or kicks of your leg.
They seem to learn, however. They begin to intentionally circumvent you, some targeting Ariadne, others attempting to catch you from behind. Ariadne tries to hold her own, but is hopelessly unskilled in physical combat. You defend her as best you can. For every body part you kick away or split asunder, however, two more come to take its place. This would be a challenge even if you were at your best, but, being as you are, you cannot help but lose heart; there are simply too many asses to kick.
>>398
These defeatist thoughts are will be the death of you. You must focus your movement! With your one free hand, you flip up the back of Ariadne's skirt and grab hold of her shift, eliciting a cute muffled outcry. Ah yes, that's better. Now you can think clearly again.
>>399
Though you are now in a state akin to a martial trance, you are still making little progress in actually defeating your many enemies. Perhaps some supernatural aid is in order, you decide. You try to place two skill points into pontification, but find that the only available skills are aerokinesis, geokinesis, biokinesis, hypnosis, technomancy and ailuromancy.
You are adrift in a roiling sea of groping, murderous flesh. Ariadne seems on the verge of despair. "Jack," she pleads, voice shaking, "T-there's too many of them! We have to run!" At that moment, however, you hear an unfamiliar, somewhat accented man's voice from behind you, say "You two! On the count of three, jump! One... two...three!"
You do as you are told, and see, in that second you are airborne, some strange fractured bolt of electricity burst from the ground where your feet just were. The shock propagates through the ground, through all the reanimated body parts, into the trees and away. With nothing more than a loud bang and a smell of ozone, you are left surrounded by a large pile of twitching bits of grunt.