The path through the hills wasn't exactly hard, but Crayon and Buckshot didn't come back with the rescue team. They weren't exactly newbies and they spent at least a year on Nidus Prime. Maybe they were slowed down by wildlife. Well, they should be okay. And after they take Almaz back, he will tell everyone about how he survived the anomalies.

Almaz lowered his left hand on the grass and slowly touched his torso. He was thirsty as hell. And water was nearby. All he needed was small amount of effort, to reach his belt with his flask on it. Then - Open the lid and slowly, very slowly so that it wouldn't be excruciatingly painful, take the first sip...

Fingers slid on synthetic tissue of his costume. The technology and stuff like that - Doesn't burn and is water proof too. Traders would always sell them for a reasonable price, and they add some gadgets too. Some say that Japanese are making everything that's hi-tech. There was even a rumor that they made invulnerable robot that could conquer the whole Nidus Prime. Albeit, the Japanese robot never got the chance to even step on the planet.

But who the fuck cares about hi-tech stuff - Almaz couldn't feel the flask on him. Maybe it dropped when he was launched on a Jumper? For that to occur, the belt must be ripped. And Almaz's belt wasn't exactly normal. The trader that sold him this belt said something about molecules and atoms. Almaz couldn't understand anything, but when the guy said that even High-Frequency blade wouldn't be able to cut it, he immediately bought it.

Belt...

The belt wasn't on him either.

Only now, Almaz understood that he was breathing freely. The backpack, that was supposed to be on his back, wasn't on his back. So someone took his backpack?

Almaz felt chill running down his spine. He couldn't even lift his fingers from the terror. Something applied pressure to his stomach.

-Hey!- Almaz shouted with hoarse voice.

He looked around with his head.

No one was there!

-Hey, is somebody there?-

Silence!

Almaz raised his hand and touched his burned face. Someone has taken the helmet off him.

Now, Almaz was actually terrified. He didn't want to accept this reality. It was by far the most nightmarish thing that could happen to you on this goddamned planet.

Ignoring the pain , Almaz turned his body to his left side. No one could approach him from the direction of Hellfire, but they other side...

His right thigh was feeling as if hot iron spear has pierced it. Almaz hunched - Who the fuck cares about pain in the chest?! - and pressed his hand on his right thigh. It didn't reduce the pain, but for some reason doing this felt right. Almaz slowly touched his thigh everywhere and with every touch the pain worsened. His femur was broken, he didn't need a doctor to understand that. Fortunately, The bone wasn't sticking out outside. Independently, he was not able to walk, but if somebody would support him from the sides... Fuck! How many days will those guys need to arrive to the nearest camp?

Wait! Wait! Wait!

What is important right now? Not to panic! Yes, you shouldn't panic. There is no reason for any panic.

Almaz hoarsely laughed. He was laughing at himself for being so stupid. He had answers in his hands already. Well, ON his hand to be precise.

The PDA!

All he needs to do, is send a message or at least a distress signal to those scouts. He could ask them about everything. What happened when he was unconscious, where the fuck did they go to and how much must he wait for them. Almaz carefully supported himself with his elbows and rolled his left sleeve up.

...

...

...

PDA wasn't on his hand...

At first, Almaz thought that he was going insane. Either that, or something that's happening to him right now, is just a bad nightmare. He could understand that someone would take his backpack and/or helmet - That way he could breathe easier. He could imagine that someone would take his belt along with his pistol and flask. BUT WHO THE FUCK TOOK HIS PDA?

PDA should only be removed if the person is dead. Even most barbarous, vile, evil, wicked and wretched people followed this law. If the PDA that you have, was registered on someone else, you couldn't sell it. Hell, some people will even kill you for that.

Does that mean that he's dead?

Almaz touched his burned face with his fingers once more and frowned from the pain. Almaz wasn't afraid to die, but he didn't want to die sooner either.

Almaz turned over his to his left side again and held his broken leg. Then he carefully put it over his healthy leg and lied down on his belly. He pressed his forehead against the ground and closed his eyes. Just because he didn't want to cry from the pain and despair.

Three heavy, slow breaths.

Almaz raised his head and opened his eyes.

For three whole minutes, he tried to focus his vision on something in the distance. And finally, he saw them. Tracks. Tracks of his ex-team. Heavy army boots were present here. That means that they were here - Buckshot, Crayon and the soldiers.

They were here and then they left.

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They abandoned him...

They took everything - weapons, containers with artifacts, backpack with meds and food. Sons of bitches even took his PDA. They will show it around the camp, in the bar, saying how stupidly Almaz died right in front of their eyes. The best guide out there - dead from a goddamned Jumper! And Jumper threw him into the Spinner, and that thing then threw him inside Hellfire. And whoosh, Almaz was dead.

And they won't even mention anything else. How they found him alive and left him to die. And they didn't even bother to shoot him to release him from suffering.

Almaz used his hands to push himself up. He needed to take a sitting position. He channeled all of his strength into his arms and pushed himself. The motion responded with pain in his chest and broken leg. Nonetheless, he succeeded. Either the pain wasn't as painful, or Almaz was just getting used to his broken body. He was going to live with this pain now. Almaz was planning to survive anyway. Now even more than ever. He didn't give a single shit about hisself, or his broken and burned body. He just wanted to stay alive to catch those motherfuckers, who left him to die. First look into their eyes to see their rotten souls. And then... Then he will decide what to do.

Almaz touched his chest. Hi-tech Japanese Armor was still on him. The test with the Hellfire, that trader didn't want to do, was now finished. The armor protected him and managed to stay in one-piece. The upper layer, which was only there for the looks, was completely destroyed. But beyond that, the armor was just as strong as it was before the "Accident". How many seconds did he spend in Hellfire though? One or two? Five? Ten? He will find that out when he meets his ex-teammates.

Almaz reached his boot and checked it. The knife that he had was gone too. Accurate guys - They didn't forget anything. That knife was expensive and just as good. It could cut through the bear's bones effortlessly.

Nothing...

Almaz had nothing right now. Nothing to protect himself and nothing to hunt with. He couldn't make a fire. He didn't have any water. He had a broken leg and in front of him stretched out gigantic piece of land, also known as Wastelands. This place was barren and deserted. People didn't come here often. To be precise, they didn't come here at all. Without a good guide, this place was impossible to cross. The lands beyond Wastelands were normal. If you would make it through here, you can just sit somewhere and scavengers will notice you eventually. Almaz didn't need a PDA to check the maps. He was a so-called Guide. People with strange ability. When humanity became interstellar species, in their numbers, people with supernatural powers were born. Although they were pretty rare, they were really powerful. Guides were people that had enhanced senses. Usually, this ability was upgrading their single sense, be it smell, sight or hearing. Lucky people had their 2 senses upgraded. However, luckiest of them didn't have any sense upgraded. Instead, they had Intuition and got the ability to see these anomalies, along with any unknown phenomena that happened near the void. Almaz was one of the luckiest ones. People always asked him about his ability. They were saying stuff like "he has a third eye" or "he sees the world differently". But that wasn't right. He could see anomalies without the detectors, but it was pretty hard to do so. He had to look out for them. As for the intuition, It was pretty simple.

You are walking and suddenly you feel a light tap inside your head. You immediately understand that something is wrong and you stop. Then you analyze the situation that you are in like any normal human.

With his abilities and healthy legs, he would take only 4 days to cross Wastelands. But with a single healthy leg?..

Almaz looked at his surroundings once again. Small hope remained that those fuckers forgot something. But he saw something else, something bad. The Scouts weren't the only living things that passed here. Right next to their tracks, were the tracks of ghouls. Judging by the sizes, there were 2 of them and one was still a kid, while the other was already matured veteran in terms of ambushing and killing people. Ghouls' tracks were on top of Army Boots' tracks. Ghouls were here after the Scouts. But why didn't they eat Almaz, even though he was defenseless and still alive?..

Almaz bit his lip but immediately frowned from the pain. He tasted slightly rusty taste of blood.

Ghouls, unlike their mythical fathers, didn't like eating carrion. They prefered eating their prey alive, or at least while they were still warm. If ghoul is already fed but finds some other prey, the ghoul will break their spine. Immobilized creature can't run, and ghoul can eat later too. The bastards that followed the Scouts must have thought that Almaz wouldn't be able to run away, huh? That means that they will come back, even if they will kill all 6 soldiers. Although, there is a higher chance that Scouts will just kill the ghouls.

And suddenly, his thought process was cut apart, by the same knife that Scouts took from him. He looked up with terror in his eyes. It wasn't evening and the start of Bright Nights. It was morning! That means that he was unconscious for how long? A night? Day? Two days?

He needed to flee right now. Even if Scouts were lucky as hell and they killed both of those ghouls, that doesn't mean that something other than 2 ghouls won't eat Almaz. This was the true beauty of Nidus Prime. Something was always eating some other thing. If you are not a hunter - then you are a prey. Humans, in essence, live with the same set of rules. Culture - It's when you don't need to break something's spine yourself.

Almaz didn't have time to be philosophical now. And he sure as hell wasn't going to rely on luck alone. He was sure that, that there wasn't even a single chance that he was going to cross the Wastelands, without weapons and while crawling.

But, because he thought of himself as good, because others thought of him as great, and sometimes even the best guide on this planet, he always had a route B.

If he would turn west from where he is right now, and crawled there just at the edge of Wastelands, in about a day he would arrive to the old Machine Landfill. Who, when or why called this deep and large pit that name, was unknown to everyone. Machine Landfill was popular for its huge dose of radiation. It was just bunch of cars, robots, androids and spacecrafts. Almaz was once ambushed here by a Devilman. Before going down there, he downed a whole bag of anti-rads and even activated 2 or 3 filters of radiation in his helmet. 2 ghouls and a Nidus Boar controlled by the Devilman followed him, even when he jumped down this huge pit. Ghouls followed him without problem, but the boar tripped and broke its legs. While he was running between the machinery, he could hear a squeal. Ghouls were dealt with easily. One got his lower body blown away by a grenade, and the other one that decided to turn invisible, was ripped to shreds by Almaz's machine gun.

When he got to the other side of this Landfill, he found a hidden cache. The guy who hid it knew what he was doing. If it wasn't for his ability, Almaz would miss it. He carefully removed the torso of an android and carefully placed twigs, and found a hole. Near the hole, on the iron android part was the logo of snake pierced by an arrow. "Serpent" Clan's sign. He didn't loot this cache, because there was no need for food or ammunition. There was also a rule on this planet. Taking other's caches was prohibited, unless you were in desperate need of something. And Almaz was in desperate need for literally everything. That was his only hope for survival, that is if no one has looted that cache already. He will crawl there, take everything, survive and then he could talk to the Serpents. He will even pay them and will hide their cache in an even better way!

Almaz slowly descended on his belly. His chest sent pain through all of his body. Almaz closed his eyes for a second, inhaled, held his breath and in an instant, pushed himself with his healthy leg. His body covered only a small distance, but his body was in hellish pain, especially his broken leg. Almaz put his forehead on the ground. No, this was a bad idea. He needed some other tactic.

Almaz moved his hands in front of him, clutched the ground and tried to drag his body. When he slightly helped his hands, with his healthy knee, he managed to do it.

Again! Hands in front, apply pressure to your knee. Push!

His broken body moved a few centimeters.

Almaz started laughing, while tears flowed down his cheeks.

He couldn't belive that he actually succeeded.