Leon didn't remember the exact moment he died.
There was noise. Metal. Screeching tires. A flash of pain so sharp it swallowed everything else.
Then nothing.
No tunnel of light. No voices. No dramatic final thoughts. Just darkness.
Not the peaceful kind either.
It felt thick and endless, like falling into deep water without ever hitting the bottom.
For a long time—minutes, hours, maybe longer—there was only that silence, then something changed.
A smell reached him first. Damp soil. Rotting leaves.
And something sour beneath it, like spoiled meat left in the sun. Leon's nose wrinkled.
The next thing he noticed was the ground beneath him. It was hard, uneven and cold against his cheek.
His eyes slowly opened.
Bright light stabbed into them immediately.
He squinted, lifting an arm to shield his face as blurry shapes slowly came into focus above him.
Trees. Tall ones.
Branches stretching overhead with patches of sky peeking through green leaves.
Leon blinked several times, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. "…What?" His voice came out hoarse and quiet.
For a moment he just lay there, staring up at the sky while his brain tried to catch up with what was going on.
I'm… outside?
That didn't make sense. The accident had been on a highway. There were cars, buildings and people. Not a forest.
Leon pushed himself upright slowly. The movement felt… strange.
Too easy.
His body didn't feel the way it should.
The ground was covered in dry leaves and patches of dirt. A few ants crawled across a nearby rock while wind rustled softly through the trees.
It was quiet.
Too quiet.
Leon rubbed a hand over his face, trying to wake himself up. But when he pulled his hand away—
He froze.
His hand looked wrong. Small.
Thin fingers. Short nails. Soft skin.
"…What the hell?"
Leon held both hands out in front of him. They looked like the hands of a child.
His breathing slowed down, confusion settling in. "This… isn't right."
He stood up quickly, but the movement threw off his balance and he stumbled slightly before catching himself on a nearby tree trunk.
The bark scraped lightly against his palm. He stared down at himself.
Shorts, a dark hooded sweatshirt that hung loosely on his small frame, bare legs and small feet inside worn sneakers.
Leon swallowed.
His heart began beating faster now. "No… no, no…" He touched his chest.
The proportions were completely wrong His arm were shorter, shoulders narrower. Everything was smaller. "Am I… a kid?"
The question sounded ridiculous even as he said them. He tried to laugh it off but the sound died in his throat. This wasn't a dream, at least it didn't feel like one.
The wind brushing against his skin felt too real. The dirt under his shoes felt too solid. Leon turned slowly, scanning the forest around him. Trees stretched in every direction.
Pine. Oak.
Bushes and fallen branches littered the ground.
Somewhere in the distance, a bird called out before taking flight.
It looked like a normal forest but Leon couldn't shake the feeling that something about it was wrong.
His senses felt… sharper. He could hear the wind moving through the leaves clearly. He could smell the damp earth and decaying plants. Even the faint buzz of insects seemed louder than it should be.
"…Why can I hear everything?" Leon frowned slightly.
Then something else hit him, a dull ache near his left eye.
He reached up and touched the spot. His fingers brushed against a small ridge of raised skin.
A scar.
Leon frowned. "I don't remember having that."
He needed to see himself. Leon began scanning the area again until he spotted a small slope nearby. At the bottom of it, sunlight glinted faintly off water.
A stream.
He walked toward it carefully, pushing past low branches and stepping over exposed roots.
The closer he got, the louder the gentle trickle of moving water became. Soon the trees opened slightly, revealing a narrow creek running between moss-covered rocks.
Leon crouched beside it. The water was clear enough to see the pebbles at the bottom. For a moment he hesitated, then he leaned forward and looked at his reflection.
The face staring back at him wasn't his.
A younger boy looked back from the water.
Short white hair framed his face, messy but natural, as if it had always been that way. His skin was a medium brown tone but what stood out the most were the eyes.
They were red.
Not bright or glowing—just an unnatural shade of crimson that contrasted sharply with the rest of his features.
Beneath his left eye ran a small diagonal scar. Leon stared at the reflection for several long seconds. "…That's not me. It can't be"
He touched his face slowly, watching the reflection mimic the movement. The scar was real.
The hair. The eyes.
Everything. He was a kid.
He looked about nine years old. Maybe ten at most.
Leon sat back slowly, his mind spinning. "Okay… think." His voice sounded steadier now, even if his thoughts weren't.
He tried to remember the accident again. The headlights.
The crash. The pain. And then— Darkness.
"…Did I die?"
The idea that he might have died made him very uncomfortable but if it was true, then this—
This was something else. Reincarnation?
Maybe transmigration?
Leon rubbed his forehead. "I've been reading too many stories." But the evidence was sitting right in front of him.
A completely different body in a completely different place. Leon looked back at the water again.
At the unfamiliar boy staring back. "…If that's the case…" He trailed off.
A strange calm settled over him. Panicking wouldn't help. If he really had been given a second life, then clinging to the old one wouldn't change anything.
The old Leon was gone. That life was finished.
He looked down at his small hands again. "…Guess I need a new name." The forest remained quiet around him as he thought.
A name—something simple.
Something that didn't belong to the life he'd lost. After a moment, one came to mind.
Jonah.
He wasn't even sure where he'd first heard it but it felt right.
Jonah exhaled slowly. "Alright."
He stood up again, brushing dirt from his shorts. "Leon's dead." He looked out across the forest stretching ahead.
From now on— "I'm Jonah."
The name felt strange on his tongue at first but not wrong. Jonah rolled his shoulders slightly, testing the new body again. Despite its small size, it felt surprisingly strong.
It felt light and fast.
His movements were smooth and controlled. Almost instinctive. "…Weird."
Most kids his age would probably struggle just running through a forest like this. But Jonah felt… comfortable.
Like his body already knew how to move. Then—
Something snapped in the distance. Jonah froze.
The sound had come from somewhere deeper in the trees. A branch breaking under weight. It wasn't an animal, that would be too heavy. Unless the animal was small.
Jonah slowly turned his head toward the noise.
His heartbeat didn't speed up, instead, a strange awareness settled over him. He could almost feel where the sound had come from. About forty meters away.
The thing making the sound was moving slowly with dragging footsteps. Jonah frowned slightly. "…What is that?"
The smell hit him next. Rot.
Stronger than before.
Something moved between the trees.
A figure that was human-shaped, but the way it walked was wrong.
Its movements were stiff and uneven, one foot dragging slightly behind the other.
The figure stepped into a patch of sunlight. Jonah's eyes narrowed. It had grey skin, sunken eyes and torn clothes stained dark with dried blood.
Its head tilted slightly as it shuffled forward. A low, wet groan escaped its throat.
Jonah stared at it. Then he realized—"…You've got to be kidding me." Because he knew exactly what he was looking at.
It was a walker.
A corpse that refused to stay dead.
Jonah felt a chill run down his spine, not from fear but from realization. His gaze slowly lifted past the walker, scanning the forest again.
The rural woods, the quiet roads he'd glimpsed earlier through the trees, the walker and the timing.
A specific memory surfaced in his mind. A video game he'd played years ago. One set in the early days of a zombie outbreak.
The story of a man named Lee Everett and a little girl named Clementine. Jonah slowly exhaled. "…No way."
All this was similar to the game
Jonah looked back at the walker stumbling slowly toward him. "…Well." He cracked his knuckles lightly. "Am I in the world similar to the game?" The walker groaned again, closing the distance.
Jonah stepped forward.
The walker lurched toward him in response, arms rising stiffly as it let out another guttural groan. Its movements were slow but persistent, like something driven purely by instinct rather than thought.
Jonah didn't rush.
He watched it carefully as it approached, studying the way it moved. One leg dragged slightly behind the other. The right shoulder hung lower than the left, as if the joint had been damaged at some point.
It was unbalanced, slow and predictable.
His eyes flicked briefly to the ground around him.
A fallen branch lay a few feet away, thick and roughly the length of his arm. He bent slightly and picked it up, testing the weight in his hand.
It was good enough for now.
The bark was rough against his palm but the wood felt sturdy.
The walker closed the distance, stepping clumsily over roots and dead leaves. Its jaw hung open as it reached for him, fingers twitching as though it could already feel his skin beneath them.
Jonah adjusted his grip on the branch.
His heart was beating faster from the adrenaline pumping through his veins. The walker lunged but Jonah moved first.
He stepped sideways, the motion smooth and quick, letting the walker's grasping hands pass through empty air. As it stumbled forward from the missed grab, Jonah swung the branch hard into the side of its head.
Crack.
The sound echoed through the trees. The walker stumbled but didn't fall. Jonah didn't hesitate as he swung again, this time aiming higher.
The branch struck the side of the skull with a heavier thud. The walker's body twisted awkwardly, its balance completely thrown off as it dropped to one knee.
Its mouth snapped open and shut, teeth clacking together as it reached blindly toward him. Jonah stepped forward and brought the branch down a third time.
This time the wood connected with a sickening crack. The walker collapsed fully onto the forest floor. For a moment it twitched, its fingers scraping weakly at the dirt then it stopped moving.
Jonah stood there for a second, breathing quietly as he watched the body.
Nothing.
No movement.
No sound except the wind through the leaves. "…Woah," he muttered under his breath.
He nudged the corpse lightly with the branch.
It was dead or at least as dead as it was going to get.
Jonah tossed the branch aside and wiped his hands on the sides of his shorts. His mind was already processing the situation, fitting the last pieces of the puzzle together.
Walkers were real.
Which meant everything else about this world probably was too.
He glanced once more at the body lying in the dirt before turning away. If this really was the beginning of that story…
Then standing around in the woods wasn't going to help him survive it. Jonah moved deeper into the forest.
The creek disappeared behind him as he stepped carefully through the undergrowth, boots pressing quietly against damp soil. The forest was thick but not wild enough to be
untouched. Branches had been broken before. The faint outline of a narrow trail cut through the trees in places, half-swallowed by weeds.
People had passed through here before. That was good.
It meant civilization wasn't too far away.
Jonah adjusted the sleeves of his hoodie absentmindedly as he walked. The fabric felt worn but comfortable. Whoever this body originally belonged to had probably worn it often.
The thought barely registered.
His attention had already shifted to something else. The forest was too quiet.
Not silent. Birds still called from somewhere deeper in the woods. Insects buzzed lazily through the warm air. Leaves rustled as the wind passed through the branches but beneath those natural sounds, something felt wrong.
Jonah felt it before he fully understood it. A subtle tightening in his chest and a faint prickling along the back of his neck.
He slowed his steps until he came to a complete stop. The sensation sharpened.
Danger.
It felt more like awareness—like some quiet alarm inside his head had switched on. Jonah's gaze slid slowly to the right.
Something was moving.
The bushes rustled softly, branches scraping against something that moved through them. The sound was uneven.
Dragging again, another walker already.
Jonah crouched automatically, lowering himself behind a fallen log. He needed to see if it was only one walker.
The strange awareness in his mind focused on a single point. He didn't just know something was there, he knew exactly where it was.
It was roughly thirty meters away, slightly uphill, moving slowly in his direction and now he could tell there was only one.
The bushes shifted again then it stepped out.
The walker looked like it had once been a middle-aged man. Its clothes hung loosely from a decaying frame—a torn plaid shirt and mud-stained jeans. Its skin had turned the dull gray of spoiled meat stretched thin over bone like the previous walker. One side of its face had collapsed inward, exposing teeth through a split cheek.
Its eyes were cloudy and lifeless, its head tilted slightly as it shuffled forward. Jonah watched it quietly from behind the log.
The first walker he'd encountered had been sudden. Instinct had taken over before he'd even thought about what he was doing.
This time was different, now he understood what he was dealing with. His mind worked calmly through the details.
The right leg dragged slightly with every step. The knee joint was probably damaged.
That meant slower turning. Poor stability.
Not much of a threat if handled correctly.
Jonah's eyes dropped to the ground beside him.
Another branch lay half-buried beneath dry leaves near his knee.
He picked it up slowly and turned it in his hand, "It looks like branches will be my weapon of choice for the time being."
The walker continued forward, pushing through bushes and stepping clumsily over roots, completely unaware of the noise it made.
Jonah stayed perfectly still. Twenty meters.
Fifteen. Ten.
The smell reached him first.
The same smell of rotting flesh mixed with the stale scent of dried blood as the previous walker.
The walker's head lifted slightly, its cloudy eyes scanning the forest without really seeing. A low groan slipped from its throat.
Jonah rose smoothly from behind the fallen log. The walker reacted instantly.
Its head snapped toward him, jaw hanging open as its arms lifted. It staggered forward.
Jonah stepped toward it instead of backing away.
The walker lunged.
Jonah shifted sideways at the last second, letting its grasping hands swipe through empty air. As the corpse stumbled past him, he drove his foot straight into its chest.
The impact knocked the walker off balance. Its damaged leg failed to catch its weight.
The corpse toppled backward, hitting the ground with a heavy thud and Jonah didn't hesitate.
Before it could start pushing itself back up, he stepped forward and swung the branch downward.
The wood connected with the side of the walker's skull. The body jerked once then it went still.
Jonah remained standing over it for a moment, watching carefully. The walker didn't move again.
Jonah lowered the branch slightly, listening.
The strange awareness in the back of his mind stretched outward again, scanning the surrounding trees.
Nothing.
No other walkers nearby just wind moving through the branches overhead. He exhaled slowly. "Right," he muttered under his breath.
That one had been easier.
Jonah glanced down at the body for another moment before tossing the branch aside, already shifting his focus back to the path ahead.
The walker wasn't what concerned him now. What mattered was everything that came next.
He stepped over the corpse and continued walking. The forest gradually began to thin.
The ground sloped downward and the trees grew farther apart until sunlight poured more freely through the canopy.
A few minutes later, Jonah reached the edge of the woods. Beyond it was a narrow two-lane road.
Cracked asphalt stretched in both directions, partially covered by fallen leaves. The faded yellow centerline had almost disappeared.
Jonah stepped out cautiously. The air smelled different here. Like hot pavement, old gasoline and something metallic.
His eyes followed the road to the left. That's when he saw it—a police car.
It sat crookedly against the roadside ditch, the front bumper smashed against a tree trunk. One of the doors hung open.
Jonah's heart skipped a beat and he approached slowly.
The vehicle looked abandoned. The windshield was cracked, and dried blood stained the inside of the door.
The police lights were off, the engine was cold.
He stopped a few steps away and studied the scene carefully. This wasn't random, something about it felt familiar.
Very familiar.
His gaze followed the road again.
The forest on one side, open fields on the other. His chest tightened slightly.
Memories from the game surfaced one after another—the police transport, the crash, Lee waking up and the officer turning.
Jonah's eyes widened slightly. "…No way." He turned slowly, scanning the road again. If this really was the same road…
Then somewhere not far from here was a small suburban neighborhood. And in that neighborhood—
A house with a treehouse in the backyard, a little girl hiding inside. Waiting.
Jonah's mind raced through everything he remembered—the babysitter walker, the walkie- talkie and Lee Everett climbing the fence.
The moment everything started.
If the timeline matched the game…
Then Lee should wake up from the crash soon. Very soon.
Jonah stared down the road.
His pulse was steady but his thoughts were moving quickly now. This wasn't just similar to The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series.
It was the same world, the same outbreak and the same beginning, which meant something else.
Something far more important. Clementine was nearby.
Alive and alone.
Jonah slowly clenched his hands. He knew how her story started. He knew how brutal this world would become. How many people would die. How many choices would destroy lives.
And now he was standing here before most of it even happened. Before the first domino fell.
His eyes drifted toward the distant tree line again.
Somewhere beyond those woods was the neighborhood. The house.
The treehouse.
Jonah took a slow breath. "If I'm really here…"
His voice was quiet but firm. "…then Clementine is close."
And for the first time since waking up in this world, Jonah started walking with a clear destination in mind.