Stories of the Dead

Stories of the Dead is the sixth mission of Escape Dead Island after the previous mission A Fighting Chance and the next mission Beauty and the Beast.

Synopsis[]

Cliff Calo needs to find several keycards scattered around the staff village so he can collect the main GeoPharm lab keycard.

Walkthrough[]

After the last mission, you'll start in the security office at the airfield with your new friend Xian Mei. There's a door at the back of the office which takes you to the staff village, where they keycards lie.
Through the door you'll see a scanner of some kind which leads to the village. Go through it.
While waiting for the scan, Cliff will contact Linda using the radio, explaining that he met Xian Mei and that Linda will be fine. She's not sure she believes him and berates him for not getting it all on camera.
Once in the staff village, you need to be careful as it's full of Shamblers and Spitters, making it hazardous.
Head down the stairs and keep to cover, crouching for stealth. You need to head to your right, towards the building at the far end, where a Spitter is located.
Several Shambers are patrolling the pathway to the stairs at the far end of the house, but with some patience and stealth, you can stealth kill without alerting the Spitter. It's best to keep things silent while you can. If you fail keeping silence, use your pistol to quickly dispose of the Spitter before dealing with the Shambers.
Head up the stairs and into the house. Cliff says he might as well do some filming, so take out your camera and snap anything that glows.
Inside the house, at the bottom of the stairs, is a laptop. Use it and you'll see a video of Faith Kimball, a scientist working at GeoPharm as she sets up a new lab. You'll find several more of these laptops as you go, but they're not mandatory, though it doesn't hurt to watch them all.
At the top of the stairs, don't go blundering around the corner right away, as there's a Shambler taking a rest on the bed, and he'll come alive when you come around the corner. Take it out with your main weapon and charge it while it gets up, you can get a few free hits to take it down easily if you do this.
Exit the room and you'll be able to go either left or right. To continue there's some stairs down but a Shambler is on them, so head right to avoid its line of sight as much as possible, then run at it with a big swing to take it down quickly.
In the garden is another laptop for you to watch. It's Faith again and she says that her experiment didn't work. There's a guy calling to her, presumably as they're about to leave work, but she's going to try the experiment again.
To the side of the garden is a slope down to another house. Go down it and stop just at the corner. There's a Shamber wandering about here, so wait for its back to be turned and creep up to stealth kill it.
You can't enter this house, but at the back of it is some pistol ammo, so grab it before you go.
Instead, go up the fallen wood planks to some houses higher up. You'll find a Spitter up here with its back turned to you, make sure you stealth kill it before it has a chance to react to you.
To your right is a ladder upwards and to your left is a way around the house. You need to go both ways but it's up to you how you do it. Going up the ladder you find Dr. Branden's House with some goodies you'll want to loot, including a medkit, while left is the main path forwards.
If you go into the house, there's a Shambler asleep on the bed who will come alive, and you'll get attacked by a Spitter as you come up the ladder, but thankfully it looses sight of you quickly. There's no way through the house, so kill the zombie, loot the place and go back down the ladder. Note that all the other Shambers will be alerted to you if you go up the house.
If you go to the left and ignore the house, you'll find some Shamblers on the ground which will come alive but if you try and stealth kill them you'll have a hard time, as they're close together and hard to separate, so you might be able to sneak up on one and stealth kill them but the others will see you and come for you.
However, if you manage to kill them all far enough away, or lure them away and kill them, there's a Spitter on the ground which will not come for you. You can sneak up and silent kill it for an easy kill.
At the far end is a jammed gate, your way through. Go up to it and mash the button prompt to get under it.
Get into cover right away as there's Spitter up high which will attack you, so grab the pistol ammo next to you and hide until it forgets you. On the other side of the barrier is a Shambler, but if you go slowly you can stealth kill it, then get into cover from the Spitter.
Head to your left and hide behind the barrels after the pipes, to wait for the Spitter to forget you. There's another two Shamblers in front of you, but head towards the barrels ahead of you and kill the one eating a body, then use your melee weapon to kill the other one.
You can't enter the house because it's dark, so go along the wall and turn off the electrical box. Cliff will then contact Xian Mei to tell her that the power is off.
Climb up the ladder and kill the Spitter, take out your anger on it! You're at the Mysterious House where another of Faith's laptops is located. It shows Faith with a gas mask on saying that 'they're here' and that she thought there was no outside intervention, whatever that means.
Instead, use your rope on the yellow boards at the end of the house to get down.
Once down, you'll be at Dr. Faith Kimball's House, on the upper balcony. You can't get down any other way, so you have to go through her house to reach the floor. Before you do, go all the way around to pick up a medit from the end of the balcony, then double back to inside the house.
Inside the room is another laptop, the last one you'll find. She's holding up a keycard in her hand saying she's locked the labs and that there might still be a cure. However, a zombie appears behind her and she screams before the video cuts off. Take the pistol ammo on the table and use the computer there.
Xian Mei will then start hacking into it from the security office. She manages to get the locations of the keycards, one inside the villa, one on the helipad and the last one inside the hangar at the airfield. However, she can't stick around as she has her own problems to deal with, but she'll try and keep in radio contact.
The door to the stairs inside Faith's house then opens and allows you down there, with zombie groans beckoning you down.
Head down the stairs. You'll enter darkness for a moment before getting to the bottom where the combat flashlight waits for you. Pick it up!
Upon entering the next room, Linda will radio and ask what's happening. Cliff says he's getting a cure from the Staff Village, and Linda tells him to be safe.
There's some pistol ammo on a dresser in the room, collect it then crouch over to the doorway. Right on the other side of the door is a zombie. Quickly stealth kill it from the doorway and get ready for a horde!
The doorway out is blocked by a crappy wooden barricade, but outside is a Spitter and huge amount of Shamblers. Break open the door and back away real quick, as they'll all come for you.
You have to try and kill them in the house, or shoot them down with your pistol. Luckily, this isn't all for nothing, as the Spitter does have a keycard on it, so loot it once it's dead to retrieve the card. You've now got Faith's keycard.
Use the keycard to get through the locked gate. Before you go, there's a workbench against the stairs out, go over to it and collect an upgrade to your melee weapon, a trusty axe! There's also some ammo further down.
Exit the village, don't mind the telephone poles that appear in a planter, and go out through the security office. Once through, you'll see the Xian Mei has made good on her promise and left, but that doesn't matter now as we're going straight across the airfield to the hanger, which is now accessible thanks to the flashlight.
The zombies are back on the airfield, however, but if you want you can avoid them. They're not that close to the hanger and if you keep crouched, you can stealth your way past them. The entrance to the hangar is blocked by a wooden barricade, but a few chops with the axe will quickly deal with that before the zombies can get to you.
After entering the hanger proper, a scene will show a Spitter in the upper office of the hanger, who has the keycard you need. Two large concrete blocks suddenly appear and block you from going back, so you need to get that keycard if you want to get out of here.
Getting to it is easy. Stay on the ground and make your way to the stairs at the back of the hanger. If you stick right, you'll find some more pistol ammo. Unfortunately, there's no way of sneaking up on the Spitter to silent kill it, so your best hope is to run and hack at it with your new axe.
Now you need to get back out, since upon collecting the keycard, Cliff contacts Xian Mei to give her the news. The door is unblocked, allowing you to get out. There's plenty of bodies in the hanger, but none of them come alive.
Now you need to exit the hanger and deal with the zombies on the airfield, as they'll likely spot you exiting the hanger, unless you're lucky and they're all looking a different way. If they did spot you, retreat back into the hanger and wait for them to loose interest. They'll eventually wander off, allowing you to silent kill them.
Now you can either go into the security office to swipe the keycard, or head forwards and get the next ones. It doesn't matter if you don't swipe it, as you'll do it with all of them anyway.
To get to your next destination, you need to go through the gap in the wire closest to the large door to the staff village. You'll need to cross the airfield again, so be careful of the Spitter and Shamblers if you haven't already taken care of them.
Go down the path towards the tunnel at the end. There's a couple of Shamblers along the way, but a few hits from the axe will take one down. You also feel an earthquake, which is a sign of Cliff's deteriorating mental state.
Once in the tunnel, you'll feel another earthquake while seeing that the main tunnel is blocked by debris. Instead go into the door to the right, up a short flight of stairs. Here's where that flashlight comes in handy again.
However, a short way down, there's yet another quake, the lights go out, Cliff blacks out and his flashlight goes off briefly. Recovering from this, you're now in a long corridor with some ominous lights at the end. Your flashlight doesn't come on again, and you can't run, so just walk forwards. Cliff will struggle as the lights at the end reveal a train thundering towards you. Because of Cliff's insanity, though, you can't dodge it and you're stuck as it gets to you. Luckily, Cliff snaps back to reality and you're back in the other tunnel.
There's no way to go other than forwards, as the door to your right requires the lever axe, something you don't have yet, so duck under the fallen pipes and continue. It's the same story with the next door you find on your left, but this one you can't open full stop, so keep going under two more fallen pipes until you reach some metal fence indicating a door out of the tunnel. Don't go through the fence, however, as this isn't the door you want. Instead go right, continuing the tunnel. You'll end up at another, open door to the other end of the blocked tunnel. This is where you leave.
Exit and go out into the light and to freedom! Well, freedom from the tunnel, that is. This is where the second keycard is, the Crown Residence aka the villa.
Getting onto the bridge, there's a Shambler here but it's easily dealt with. Just after the second car, however, is a Spitter up some stairs, and he'll spot you easily.
Unfortunately, you need to deal with it as it'll greatly hinder your progress, and while you could pistol it to death, there's a lot of zombies around and it's best to keep silent. Run to it and kill it quickly. Don't worry about blowing up the explosive barrel behind it, those can only be detonated by pistols or firearms. It's not required to do this, but it'll make your life a lot easier if you take it out now. There's a medkit up here anyway, so it won't be for nothing!
There's a radio in a cardboard box near an explosive barrel in front of the security checkpoint booth. There's a lot of zombies nearby and you can use these things to your advantage. You can activate the radio and run to cover elsewhere, either on the high ground above or a car on the bridge. When the zombies investigate the radio, you can blow up the barrel with the pistol, clearing them out. This is why taking out the Spitter is a good idea. If you don't do this, you can always do it the old fashioned way and stealth kill or hack them all up with your axe. Sometimes they don't get attracted to it, or loose interest before reaching the top, so just go and hack them up anyway for wasting your time! Because there's a lot of them, stealth killing isn't that feasible, so dodge and weave as you hack them up with the axe.
The alternate way to do this part is to go into the checkpoint building and use the switch on the wall next to the door to deactivate the electric fence. This will allow you to go through it to the right and find a place to attach your rope, so you can rappel down. You'll still have to fight the Shamblers and Spitter, though.
Heading down the stairs there's some destructible objects you need to destroy to continue, as well as some barbed wire which will hurt you if you touch it so... don't do that.
You'll find a ladder against the wall which you can use to climb up and over, to continue your quest to find the keycard.
If you head forwards, you'll find the Tennis Court and be introduced to a new zombie, the Siren. This zombie is essentially like the Screamer from Dead Island: Riptide and we all know how much they suck, so this is no different! It screams when it is introduced and wakes up the zombies lying on the court.
The best way to deal with this is to keep high on the overlook above the tennis court and pistol down the Siren. If it's moving around, kill a Shambler with a headshot to get some quick bullet time slow motion, so you can line up shots on the Siren. You need to kill it anyway, as it has the second keycard.
Once it's dead, it's just a case of cleaning up the Shamblers left with it. There's also a few more on the ground that don't come alive, but you might as well kill them anyway. Once the Siren and everything else with it is dead, collect the keycard. Now you need to get to the helipad.
Before you can do that, however, Cliff radios Xian Mei to tell her the news, then he has another episode, where the screen fades to white and you're put into a bathroom bathed in green light. You've no idea where it is an the game lists its location as '???' on the screen. Still, just walk around the corner to find yourself in some sort of changing room of some kind, with lockers and a bunch of washing machines. Before you can process it, the screen fades while and you're put back on the tennis court. There's some pistol ammo on the ground with 'TURN BACK' painted on the ground. More worryingly, there's now a massive hole in the fence where something has broken through it from courtside. However, nothing you can do so take the ammo and go up the stairs at the far end of the court.
Using the keycard you now have, you can open the previously locked door to get back to the main road to the villa, so use the card and go through. There's a Spitter somewhere, but don't worry about it, you'll soon have a lot more than one Spitter to worry about!
In the centre of the path is a tree, and the Spitter is behind it. When you attack it, however, around 5 Shambers appear out of nowhere around you along with another Spitter. Kill the Spitter you started with, as well as whatever else you can before quickly running back to recover health. Kill the Shamblers as they come for you, then kill the Spitter once the rest are dead.
No more surprises! Run for the bridge back to the tunnel!
Once you get onto the bridge, however, Cliff REALLY starts to loose it! Shipping containers start to fall from the sky while Shamblers appear to block your path. Don't worry too much about the Shamblers, as the containers can easily fall onto you and kill you, so dodge the zombies if you can and try to get back to the tunnel. There's also a Spitter here, but if you attack it, a container will fall on you and you will die, reset to the tennis court again, so ignore it and go to the tunnel.
Once in there, the zombies will follow you, but once you're part of the way in, they'll loose track of you and forget. You need to head all the way back the way you came, right back to the airfield. There's no zombies here, so you've got some respite, and there's nothing new unlocked, so go through to the airfield at your own pace.
The airfield is now clear of zombies, so you can either swipe your new keycard or continue to the helipad, it doesn't matter. Either way, go through the other gap in the fence to head to the other tunnel of the airfield, the one you used to first get here when you were following the crashed plane.
Duck under the rubble to enter the tunnel. Linda will radio again, still sceptical about Xian Mei and still not believing that she's helping Cliff, but he tells her not to worry. Go through the tunnel to the other side. You'll be back at the pathway to the GeoPharm Labs, but there's no Bouncers here this time.
Head up the path and silent kill the Shambler eating a body in the pathway, it's best to keep it quiet for now. The walls will start breathing as you go along, but it's fine, don't worry about it, just Cliff loosing his mind.
You've once again got two ways you can go, either through the jungle or through the car park of the labs. There's a couple of Infected if you go through the jungle, but there's a Spitter and Shambler at the labs, so it's a pick your poison scenario. Either way, you'll end up back on the path.
On the path is a Spitter, and if you're coming from the jungle there's no way of sneaking up on it like from the labs, so just run at it. If you're coming from the labs, you can stealth kill it.
As you proceed down the path, Shadow Zombies will start falling from the sky, disappearing in puffs of smoke when they hit the floor. Don't let this distract you from the fact that there's a Spitter on a rock overlooking the path. You can sneak up on it by keeping right on the path and climbing up some rocks to stealth kill it, then kill the Shambler that's here, also eating a body.
Proceed to the end of the path, to the cave system you used to reach the airfield in the first place. Get the army knife from the cave system if you missed it the first time.
Once at the end of the cave, you'll see the broken fence and pile of bodies. After going through the hole in the fence, take an immediate left, before you reach the signpost. If you reach the pile of bodies, you've gone too far. There's a sign post right after the fence, though, so look at that for directions.
You can't just run through it, though, as there's now Infected and Spitter along the path you took with your friends all the time ago when you left the beach. Keep low and quiet to avoid or stealth kill them, and look around as the area behind where the first Spitter is has a medkit.
At some point down the path you'll find a nearly destroyed wooden bridge leading to a concrete tunnel with a Spitter overlooking it. This is the way forwards for you, so go back and kill the Spitter if you haven't already, then proceed to the tunnel. In the tunnel entrance will be a Spitter banging on the wall for whatever reason, so kill it to put it out of its misery.
You'll soon find out this tunnel is also blocked, so go up the stairs to your left and through the door, ducking under the pipes. Part way down the way is blocked by more rubble, but there's a massive hole in the wall with pipes leading through it. This is your ticket past the blockage, so enter the tunnel and go down it to reach the other side.
Whoever was in charge of this tunnel didn't do a great job of maintaining it, as there's yet another blockage. However, there's a ladder leading up to allow you to progress, so go up it.
You can finally go forwards again but there's yet another blockage, so once again go up the handy ladder to avoid it.
You'll arrive in the Freight Elevator, and Cliff will contact Xian Mei on the radio. She'll tell him to take the elevator up to the helipad.
Make sure to look around before you press a button near the door. There's a collectible, some pistol ammo and, most importantly, the advanced axe! Yes, a better weapon over your axe! It's sitting on a workbench, so take it quickly!
Once you've collected everything, press the button to call the elevator. Thankfully it's already here, and the doors will just open, but it doesn't look very friendly, especially with that radio in it. So, enter it and keep hidden, just in case, after pressing the button on the side of the elevator to get it to move.
It's too good to be true, as the elevator will suddenly get stuck and you her Xian Mei talking to someone else on the radio that Cliff can't hear. She's refusing to be something, but static cuts out. Infected start falling from the sky, and Cliff will radio her saying he doesn't think this is the right elevator.
There's too many of them for you to feasibly stealth kill, but your new advanced axe can make short work of them, so it's not too much of an issue, though they come in two loads of four Infected.
After you clear out the two sets of Infected, the Bouncer will make his triumphant return! However, he forgot to bring any friends, so you can easily sneak up on him and stealth kill him. Better luck next time, zombie!
After he's dead, the elevator will start moving again and the red light will go away. The door will open on the other side of the elevator to the one you entered with, and you'll be at the other loading depot. There's just one Infected here, so stealth kill it, loot the place for collectibles and loot, then proceed through the door in the middle to continue to the helipad.
You'll go up a slope to get out of the building and into the outside again. Don't go into the hatch in front of you as it's a way to the Underwater Labs DLC and not a part of this mission. Instead go right.
Up ahead is a chain link gate which has been broken open. This is your way to the helipad.
Upon entering the helipad area, you'll have a cutscene play which shows a new enemy type, the Butcher. He also has the final keycard you need. A load of debris blocks all the exits from the area, so there's no escape, you have to fight him.
His fight is very tough, so here's some pointers:
- He can leap for you like a Bouncer if you're far enough away. However, he's vulnerable after this for a few seconds, allowing you to get a free hit in.
- After you hit him once, he will block all your other attacks with his claws, so don't bother trying to get in multiple hits, it'll just drain your stamina and leave you open.
- Right after dodging, he unleashes a whirlwind attack, spinning around as he moves forwards for a few seconds. This can easily kill you, so run away before he does it.
- He hits hard and rapidly, dodging is your best friend. When he attacks, just dodge and run away.
- The best strategy for beating him is to run away and wait for him to leap at you. When he does, dodge to the side then use a heavy attack for maximum damage. Don't try and chain several attacks as he'll just block them.
- You start off spotted, so trying to stealth kill him is impossible.
- Amazingly, you can actually execute the Butcher! When his health is low enough, using a heavy attack will knock him down, allowing you to execute him!
- Using the pistol is pointless, as the first shot will do barely any damage and he'll block the rest, so stick to your melee weapon.
After he's finally dead, you can pick up the keycard. When you do, however, the screen will go white and you'll be in some strange place that's very green with some ominous shaking. The location is displayed as '???' so who knows where you are. There's some pistol ammo in front of you, though, so collect it and just avoid the few Shamblers about. Something is chasing you and the place looks like a maze. Before it can reach you, though, it fades white again and you're at the helipad.
Once back, Cliff will contact Xian Mei to tell her he has the keycards and she replies to tell him to collect the keycard from the office. He's shocked she doesn't want it, but she has a different reason for being there, not to 'chase cures'. When pressed, she curtly tells him they should maintain radio silence. Linda calls in, though, asking about Xian again, and Cliff describes her as a 'certified badass'. Linda is still suspicious, but is happy as long as she's on their side.
You can now start to make your way back to the airfield. You can either return the way you came, back to the freight elevator, or head underneath the helipad. There's a rope attachment point which allows you to get into a gondola to return to the villa. This is the faster way, as then you only need to go through the tunnel to get back to the airfield. The gondola is far quicker, as well as clear of enemies, so I highly suggest taking this route.
Once you're back at the airfield, go onto it. When you do, it'll suddenly turn night time and lightning will strike on the cars, electrocuting a Shambler. Not only this, but the things the lightning hit will start to float in the air, and more zombies will land, including a Spitter.
However, this is no ordinary occurrence, as if you try and enter the security office or leave the airfield, you'll see thick vines blocking your way. Luckily, the zombies aren't looking at you and won't attack you right away, they'll instead stand there... menacingly, looking at the lightning and hovering things.
You can still stealth kill them, though, so go ahead and kill the Infected and Spitter that are there. When you do, however, it returns to daytime, the stuff and lightning disappear and you're left with a rather awkward circle of zombies. They still don't attack you right away, so just move around the circle and stealth kill them all.
Upon entering the office, swipe the keycards so the door unlocks. It automatically swings open and you can collect the labs main keycard inside the room.
After collecting it, a laptop on the table near the monitors starts to flicker into life, playing music which leads into a broadcast. Whoever it is broadcasting will be joined by their daughter Alexis. As the man talking starts to drone on about something, Cliff fails to notice the office slowly start to fill up with green gas, and when he does it's too late. Cliff is overwhelmed by the gas and falls over, unconscious.
A cutscene plays, which is just bright light and a memory of Cliff and Devan talking back when they were in college, drunk. Cliff is drunk, that is, talking to Devan about Linda, who left a short while before. Devan asks if Cliff is into her and the drunken Cliff says she's not his type. In his drunken state, he apparently put on a chicken hat while trying to explain to Devan that he's 'everyone's type'.
This finally ends the mission!

Notes[]

It's possible that the man talking is actually Cliff's father, Tom Calo, since he mentions he has a son who would 'rather go drinking with his friends', which is something Cliff does all the time. This could be Cliff hallucinating his father broadcasting about him.
This mission is one of the longest in the game, if not the longest.

New Game + Differences[]

At the helipad, after killing the Butcher and getting the final security keycard, you can see a wooden shack next to the helipad itself. In your first run through, this is locked by the keycard door. However, using the unlabeled keycard, you can open the lock and get in the shack. Inside is the hidden keycard.