‘Urgh… Where am I?’

‘Last thing I remember…” The dark circle flashed before his eyes again. A falling shard had entered his vision at just the right moment, redirecting the bullet to graze his head while the shard collided with his skull directly and knocked him unconscious.

In those moments, his life had flashed before his eyes. He withstood the pains of training his body, tearing his body day after day to build strength. But the fateful day he applied to the military, he found out that simply lifting weights wasn’t enough to become the person he wanted to be.

While he was comparatively stronger to others and able to lift greater weights than them, he had neglected to exercise his legs entirely. When the physical test came, he was unable to run the full lap around the residential area and with his legs dragging him behind, he stumbled and fell over to see the backs of the other participants off in the distance. Embarrassed and ashamed, he dragged his feet back home.

That might’ve actually been the correct decision though, as being a soldier was nothing glorious. He most likely would’ve scored enough to get through, but having fallen over and with his face and clothes covered in dust, he was much too embarrassed to continue on.

When he went home that day, his mother, already there, saw his state and interrogated him until he spilled everything. He had gone off to apply in secret, wishing to escape the normal and boring life that he would’ve had to bear every day. When his father arrived home, his mother told his father and then it became a lecture.

Long story short, he wasn’t stupid enough to still become a soldier after his father imprinted the risks into his mind. The government suppressed any news on how many soldiers died and how many made it back, but it was simple to take a sample, who consisted of his father’s friends and those he knew about. Almost none of those whom he knew and would’ve contacted him had they returned actually had contacted him.

Whether they had returned was unknown, but the ones who did contact him hadn’t ever seen combat or was even assigned to fight. All they were assigned to was logistics, moving pallets of supplies around.

It was simple to see that nobody was the same after going to war and he was well dissuaded.

What even made him want to go to war?

Ah that’s right. A group of criminals broke through the gate and invaded his school. They entered his school and held his class hostage. Then their heads popped into a mist of blood, spraying the organs everywhere.

It was glorious.

He’d been saved.

Looking back, that was probably the most foolish feeling he’d ever felt.

If they were able to kill the men, what’s not to say they couldn’t kill him? Or even worse, have an order miscommunicated.

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Dangerous men they were.

A sharp pain cut across his mind.

While he was left with a gash, the shard had spun off with some blood, imitating the spray of blood that would have come out if he really was shot. He then proceeded to tumble down the hill they were climbing on and only stopped at the bottom.

The shard had only knocked on his helmet, which now had a crack in it and was hanging together by its last fibers and helmet strap. David was otherwise thankfully unharmed and only left with a headache.

He had now escaped from the clutches of those people, so what was he to do now? Go back and get revenge? No, not possible, the government district was too hard to break into.

He lay there, just like a dead body as he vomited on himself.

Feeling the splitting headache, He decided to rest for the night, sleeping with his own vomit around him.

--Tunnels--

Two moles were on top of each other, rocking back and forth. They occasionally tumbled around, flinging up the plastic mush that was all around them. A sweet scent filled the air, which was a stark contrast to the previous stale air.

The two moles finally fell limp from their tumbling around. The one which was on bottom lay still which the other began to stumble away back into the whole from which he came.

--Northern Front--

Night was the best time to move. Everybody wanted a bit of comfort under the night sky with the stars that sparkled above. Each star shone like a diamond against the night sky as they flickered from the objects that occasionally blocked their light. In the darkness, eyes that glowed a dim light opened and scanned the surroundings.

Most soldiers got the serum of a gorilla, as the serums could change the instincts of the person it was injected into and gorillas were similar enough.

Scouts like him however, were given a cat serum. Although the appearance changing effect was widely disapproved of among the soldiers, they were given cat ears for better hearing… Would you like to imagine a buff, frowning man with cat ears?

Cats and gorillas had long gone into extinction, as humans began eating any creature they could find and as the world began to run out of space for humans.

Legends speak of a place with clean air, trees as far as the eye could see, and refreshing water at every corner. There, different species of animals of all shapes and sizes exist, where the last safe havens from human intrusion exist. Humans aren’t exactly stupid either. They quite obviously needed oxygen and … Just kidding.

There simply were no more forests. The oxygen was clearly provided from the ocean, where a green film covered the surface. Not a single bit of land was left untouched by man.

What land that wasn’t covered by plastic consisted entirely of desert. Little care had gone into protecting the environment as depleted uranium was shot everywhere and prevented life from growing.

The dirt was simply unsuitable to grow anything in. Even the soil used in farming had undergone multiple treatments to make it barely habitable for growing plants.. Only the hardiest of crops could grow, which consisted of a single type of grain. Barley.

There were fields upon fields of barley and when a gust of wind blew by, sometimes those grains would be carried by the wind into the world beyond. The organic matter outside built up, but with the plastics breaking down under the sun, toxins were leaked all around and infected every surface, preventing life from growing up.

Everything awaited the single plant which would be able to resist these toxins and spread across the land. Well, one plant did, but it depended on toxins the bacteria produced. Which couldn’t be exposed to the sun or else they would die. Well, plan failed.

At least we still got beer though.