“Yeah, sure,” the tarp is pushed out of the truck into the waiting arms of his comrade then they shuffle backward until Gloves can hop out. “You know what can solve all of that?”

“What?” Gloves looks over at his friend, envious of the brown cap shading his face from the sun's harsh rays, rays that are beating down into his eyes and the back of his neck.

“A night away from everyone will do them good. Cohen’s been stuck working with all those kids, she needs a good--” The heavy bundle is carried between their bodies as they slowly approach the shallow pit.

“Ugh,” Gloves shifts the bundle a bit higher and sidesteps a rock. “Dude, don't start with that again.”

“What?” Brown Cap has a lewd smile spread across his face.

“People’ve got real problems...sex doesn’t solve everything.”

“Hey, did I say that? All I mean is-,” he adjusts his grip on the tarp and looks over his shoulder at the large cat-sized maggots squirming in the sandy pit.”Show me a couple and I’ll tell you who ain’t getting any. You fart down there, and people hear it three floors below you. Nicky ain’t into that.”

“You know what else Nicky ain't into?”

They pause as they get to the edge of the trash pit and lower the bundle to the ground. The young man with the brown cap pulls it off to fan himself but spares a glance at his friend to raise an eyebrow. ‘What?’

“You,” his close-mouthed smile can’t hold back the laugh that shakes his frame.

“Haha,” Brown Cap rolls his eyes at the corny joke. “I ain’t into him or anything, but Nicky ain’t half bad. You could learn a thing or two from him.”

“Like what? How to get whipped in an apocalypse? That guy could have any pick of the girls and he went for Cohen?” Gloves shakes his head at the foolish choice.

Brown Cap wiggles his eyebrows and crouches down to untie the strings securing the tarp around the lengthy body. “He ain’t want a girl. He wanted a woman,” With the ties undone, him and the other errand boy back up and turn the bundle parallel with the edge. “Cohen can handle herself out here that’s why Dennis stuck her with those orphans. Fred alone would get done in by a plastic bag. I’m surprised he’s made it this long.”

“F*ckin’ Fred. Did I tell you what he-”?

The truck radio goes off, and both men pause to look at the vehicle. “Charlie, Ed? Charlie, Ed? You still out there...at the Mouths? OVER,” Brown Cap jogs over to the passenger side and leans into the truck to reply back.

“Roger, roger.”

“Toilet kids sighted some critters down by the river, can’t fill the pails. Stop down there and give them a hand then hustle back. OVER.”

“Aiy, okay. Roger that,” he sets down the radio microphone and slides out of the truck.

“Damn...Let’s hurry this up. Toilet kids need a save again,” Brown Cap bends over to shove at the bundle wrapped in the tarp while Gloves keeps the tarp within his hands.

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Gloves scoffs. “I ain’t getting stuck in a two-hour line cause those twits can’t stand to kill a few bugs.”

“Okay, let’s toss this sad sap and kill some goons.”

The corpse wrapped in the tarp tumbles out with a few shoves and careens down into the maggot infested pit below. The errand boys wrinkle their nose at the sight, roll up the tarp, and turn to head back to their vehicle. As the truck drives away, southeast down toward the brown muddy water, the body continues to roll toward the center of the pit.

SYSTEM REBOOT COMPLETE

SYNTHETIC INTELLIGENCE DEVELOPER LOADING...

DOWNLOAD COMPLETE

ANALYZING DISK SPACE...

UPLOADING MEMORY FILES...

TURNING ON VISUAL EFFECTS…

STARTUP PROCEDURE ACTIVATED...

.....

ADMIN DISTRESS EXCEEDED MAXIMUM PARAMETERS

ADMIN’S LIFE FORCE WAS WITHIN JEOPARDY

PRIORITY #1 FAILURE IMMINENT

ENTANGLEMENT INITIATED

INFILTRATING EXPLORERTECH INDUSTRIES WASHINGTON CITY DATABASE

The body rolls to the center of the pit impeding the path of several maggots searching for decaying food or animal scraps. The maggots are starving from having to burrow into the sand to hide from the wrath of the sandstorm’s winds. One maggot; about the size of a well-fed cat, white, and moist; crawls onto the newest clump of nutrients and tries to acquire a taste. The clump bucks the maggot off its back. Violent spasms run up and down the body’s form.

“Aaaaaaaah!” Sia screams face down in the sand. The scream is muffled by the gravel, trash, and remains mixed into the pit. She tries to take a breath and chokes, flailing and scraping an arm through the scum. Her other arm, jerks from under the object pinning it down, and pushes against the earth to roll her onto her side. Finally, air feeds past her muddy, split lips, but she has no time to enjoy the bliss of survival when a current of pain flows through her body once more.

“Aaaaah!” she is in agony. It’s as if acid has been poured over her head, the sensation morphs while traveling down her spine, and a fire ignites at the back of her legs. Her head feels too small, her mind feels it will tear under the immense strain.

“Necra bolo!” Sia tries to bring a hand to swipe at her eyes. She can’t see. She can’t see. After being stuck in that darkness for who knows how long... she needs to see, but her arms won’t cooperate. Her head lolls back against the grimy soil as another spasm courses through her. “Aaaaaaaah!”

Somehow, she rolls back onto her stomach and wriggles across the.... ground. She can feel moist walls shift around her as she labors toward...somewhere. Her throbbing limbs are weighed down by at least twenty kilograms of suffering each, but something keeps them moving across the uneven terrain.

Her body begins to feel numb, but her mind continues to pulsate alternating levels of awful and intense pain.

“Reeeeeema!”

‘What?’

“Necra Bolo! Min perdern tregar roman!”

‘What?!’ Sia doesn’t understand the words spewing out her mouth. “Reeeeema! Lenn, min perdern tregar roman!”

“Aaaaaaaah!” She can’t take it. She can’t survive something like this. “Reeeema!”

‘Put...ter? Is--’ Sia tries to communicate with the device. It must hear her, it must have woken her up. Why has she woken up in this condition? ‘S.I...?’

But the Synthetic Intelligence Developer is not the voice to answer.

‘Help...me....’ a deep male voice reverberates within her aching mind. Sia cringes and curls into herself before projecting back a message.

‘Apex...is tha-...’ Sia struggles to form her thoughts into coherent words. How is Apex occupying her mind at the same time she is? This has never happened before. What the hell is going on?

‘Please...reeeema...pleaaseeee...help...me.’

The scream that tears through them almost rips the combined consciousness out of their hands. Sia’s mud encrusted eyes gape open as she convulses on the ground and a deep wail emits from her weakened vocal cords. When the shudders cease to wrack her body, she rapidly blinks to get a better view of her surroundings and sees the pale, translucent skin of large larvae squirming nearby her.

“Uggaaaaaaah!” She tries to raise herself up, but only succeeds in kicking her legs uselessly against the trash-strewn ground.

The commotion within the pit doesn’t go unnoticed.