Andy “found” a bottle of gin in the hands of some sleeping drunk and made his way out of the Underbelly. It was an old trick he’d learnt in secondary school–if you kept drinking through the morning, the hangover would never catch up with you. Meanwhile, Clara would be asleep in their shack, wherever that was. Andy tried to guess by the position of the sunlight, but it was useless when he didn’t know their shack number.
Staggering around the streets, Andy stumbled upon the garage near Quadra’s gate, found their jeep and climbed up on the roof to kip. Some hours later, a horrible sound woke him, drilling inside his skull, welding and hammering into his eardrums. Sitting upright, Andy discovered that the metalworking was in fact real. Mechanics were working on a lorry two rows down. Andy plugged his ears and tried to sleep through it, but it was no use. Hopping down, he took his bottle over with him to the station.
“Do you mind keeping it down,” he said. “I pay good money to park in an area like this, and I don’t expect to be kept awake by ye’er-do-wellers.”
Andy was largely ignored, save for a few glances from the mechanics. Defeated, he sat atop a lonely wheel, sipping his gin, inspecting the vehicle. A small generator hummed beside the compact lorry, onto the front of which three mechanics were finishing welding a horn-beaked dozer blade. They worked beneath the painted eyes of a furious stallion, whose muscular snarl encompassed the entire driver’s compartment of the lorry. A mane of barbed wire flowed above its brow between two armoured firing compartments, which jutted out of the roof like metal ears. The cargo compartment was reinforced with sheet-metal cut with firing slits so that occupants could shoot from inside. It was covered in patchwork insignia, names and drawings of demonic eyes which bled tiny red tears where the spray pain had streaked during application. The largest of the graffiti was in the centre: three white lines, like spearheads, each of a slightly different length, piercing a crescent. It was as close to a tank as Andy had seen in years. He wondered if they could commission whoever had done the lorry’s paint job to snazz up their jeep.
Something bashed into Andy’s side. He groaned and looked up. Clara was standing above him, four duffel bags in her hands, carrying their weapons. She slung two onto his lap. “Have a good night?”
“Exquisit.”
“Good. Get up then.”
Loading their jeep, Clara took the drivers’ side and Andy resigned himself to the passenger seat. It would be a slow journey then.
“You got something fun for us?” Andy said.
“Zombies, don’t you remember?”
“Erm, yeah.”
“We’re heading into a city to locate a research facility and rescue personnel and technology. All the details are on my terminal if you want to look.”
“Not now,” he said, adjusting his seat as far back as it could go.
After a while, Clara started the engine and they set off, the same dreary album spun in the CD player. They pulled up behind the battlewagon which Andy had seen being serviced, and two pickup trucks took up the rear. Their little convoy of four rumbled towards Quadra’s gate and out onto the road beyond. Suddenly, he wasn’t sleepy anymore. It felt good to be on the move again.
The landscape gradually transformed through the morning as they drove down valley roads towards the mountain range’s exit. They travelled fast–the main road had been cleared for passage–derelict vehicles piled up against the sides, blockages removed to improve access in and out. Signs directed their way, hanging below the old-world signposts. Ahead, the battlewagon slowed as they trundled through a patch of road that had been hit by a landslide. By the roadside, a dozen or so men worked with buckets and shovels to clear the path. They looked skinny and tough, like dried meat. Andy thought he recognised one as an old drinking buddy he’d had in the Underbelly.
“Hey,” he shouted out of the window. “Burn’o.” It was an affectionate name Andy had for the old fellow, whose face and torso were malformed from terrible burns he’d suffered during the cataclysm. “Burn’o, what’s up.”
Burn’o looked up from his work shovelling stones, glowering at Andy as they rolled on by. Andy shook his flask out of the window, but Burn’o eyed him wearily. He couldn’t have recognised Andy, otherwise, why wouldn’t he have accepted the drink?
“It’s booze, Burn’o.”
“Andy,” his sister admonished. “Stop causing trouble.”
“I was being charitable,” Andy said, crossing his arms. “Never doing that again.”
By afternoon, the mountainous terrain sank into hills and valleys opened up into barren fields. The roads widened, forming dual carriageways, scattered with derelict vehicles. Every so often, old villages cropped up by the roadside. Many were inhabited, but they weren’t somewhere Andy would like to stop for refreshments. The land was arid, murky streams, scarce and scrawny vegetation. A group of children had stopped to watch their convoy pass. They were beleaguered, one seemed as though they couldn’t stand up straight. Andy waved. Kids liked it when you waved.
At each village’s entrance, there was a pole with four flags. Andy recognised it from somewhere. He was sure Clara would know the meaning of it. The convoy rolled to a stop beside a lonely building, one of the walls of which had a large white square and blue circle graffitied on the brick. In front of them, the battlewagon coughed smoke out of its exhaust. It was then that Andy noticed the registration plate read ‘KILL’ in broken letters where someone had scratched the paint off to reclaim the text. If Andy squinted, he could read what it had once been: AK19 BJL. Not as catchy.
“I’m going to see what’s up,” Clara said, hopping out of the jeep, leaving the engine running. She strode ahead as somebody exited the battlewagon and approached a third person–a smartly dressed man who came from the roadside building. Andy watched them all converse, trying to read their lips, but he had never learned how to, so it stopped being entertaining pretty quick. The man in a suit was using a radio with a large antenna. He was armed with a slick military rifle, similar to the one Andy had taken from their employer’s armoury recently. When Clara returned, she jammed the jeep into reverse and turned around.
“What’s up?” Andy said.
“We can’t go that way. The road’s too dangerous.”
“Really?”
“We’re gonna have to make a detour.”
“I don’t mind dangerous,” Andy said.
“Our employer does. We can’t be getting slowed down fighting Fishfolk on the road.”
“What’s the problem then?”
“The problem is, I didn’t plan for the change of route.”
“You planned a route?”
“Of course I did.”
“It’s just east isn’t it?” Andy pointed.
Clara shook her head, concentrating on the manoeuvre. As she turned around, the battlewagon revved its engine and overtook them and the pickup trucks, putting their jeep at the rear.
“Cheeky,” Andy said.
They passed back the way they came for thirty minutes then took a detour right, off the established highway onto narrower paths.
“You take over,” Clara said, taking the jeep out of gear and holding the wheel for Andy to climb over. Once they’d swapped seats, Andy switched the CD player off and swigged his hip flask for safe driving and good luck. Clara became absorbed in her wrist terminal while Andy took the reins, avoiding potholes, wreckages and the occasional derelict building spilling onto the roadside. Ahead, the battlewagon carved a path with its horn-nosed dozer blade, battering aside any obstacles for them to follow in its wake.
Stubborn, shabby hedgerows finally gave way to the barren land. Their tyres kicked up dust and as the air took on a mineral taste. There were no birds or insects, barely a breeze. Clara closed their windows and turned off the AC. A patch of black, like tar, was baked into the road beneath an animal skeleton. Scraps of desiccated flesh clung to its bones.
“Boring one, this,” Andy said. “What is it, dust?”
“An apocalypse of famine,” Clara corrected.
“Dust-ocalypse. Death by boredom. I can’t wait for the zombies.”
“You know, there might not be much to shoot once we reach the city.”
“You’re kidding me?” Andy said aghast.
“The mission is search and rescue, essentially. And a lot of the reports suggest that the zombies are slow and docile.”
“Oh no, come on. Seriously?”
“This is about professionality, Andy, not kill-count. We have a job to do.”
“If they’re some slow-ass Walking Dead zs, I’m going to be really disappointed.” He had promised Julie some killing. She’d be awfully upset with him if he couldn’t deliver.
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
The famine spread for miles. They drove slowly around the outskirts of an old town, deserted and dry, passed by hours of desolate farmland, dried up trenches and stagnant reservoirs. Occasionally, an obstacle would turn them around and they would have to find a different route, and each time, the battlewagon took point. After a while, they switched drivers again and Andy kicked his legs up on the dashboard.
There was no telling what had caused the famine apocalypse, but as the sun set behind them, they discovered what had stopped it spreading. On the horizon, a grey sky loomed over an untamed jungle. Creeping plants carpeted the dry earth in patches along the roadside, scraggly tufts bursting through the dry earth. The moist smell of vegetation carried on a migrating wind. Clara caught up to the battlewagon and flashed their headlights, then pulled over.
“Refill,” she said, hopping out and grabbing a fuel canister from the boot. They weren’t empty yet, but now was probably a good time to top up before heading into the jungle.
Ahead, the passenger-side doors opened on the battlewagon and a man dressed in a tracksuit and hoodie jumped out into the beam of their headlights. He looked old, with scraggly blonde hair, wearing a sidearm at his hip and a large hunting knife.
“Not too scared to travel through the night, are you?” The man approached and put his hand on their jeep’s bonnet.
“Is that what it looks like?” Clara said, sloshing the fuel canister to emphasise her point. “Although now you mention it, perhaps we should take a break and continue at first light.”
“Killer plants, that’s what our terminals say.” The man walked past Andy, approaching his sister, hands in his pockets. Andy eyed him in the wing mirror.
Clara screwed the fuel cap back on. “Carnivorous plants, class unknown. We don’t have much information on the zone, unless you have better maps than the Visionaries.”
“Class nuttin’. The Trojan can plough through grass. We’re not scared of a little vegetation.”
Clara threw the canister back in the boot and walked around to the driver’s side. “It’s going to be a lot easier during the day.”
“You ain’t seen what we got yet,” the man said, returning to his vehicle. “Just keep following us.”
Clara scoffed, climbed back in and started the engine. “Trojan. What a stupid name.”
“Is that what they called their battlewagon?” Andy said.
“Yeah.”
“Huh, pretty cool. Why didn’t we name our jeep?”
“She has a name,” Clara said, patting the steering wheel affectionately. “Hillary.”
Andy winced. “Why not something cool?”
“You can’t talk.”
“What?”
“Naming your revolver Duewy.”
“It’s Julie,” Andy said. “Don’t be rude.”
It took them a further hour to reach the edge of the jungle proper. A wall of plantlife rose above them like a great wave, obscuring the night sky above. Mulch churned under their wheels as they dove into the jungle, slowly swallowed alive. Their vision was reduced to just a few metres around them illuminated by their headlamps. An exotic array of plants climbed atop of one another, grasping for the sky. Wiry moss with tiny blue flowers clung to a derelict vehicle, defying gravity. A tree had been usurped by vines, now lay decaying and covered in fungi. Umbrella leaves greedily shaded entire swaths of the jungle, while palm trees stood tall like arrows amongst the undergrowth. Their jeep rocked on its suspension over the cluttered roads, following the Trojan battlewagon on and on into the thick of it.
“We shouldn’t have come here at night,” Clara grumbled.
Andy checked his watch. It had been a couple hours and nothing had happened. A cluster of pollen drifted past the window, glowing blue luminescent. The lights were pretty, but likely poisonous. Andy put his hand against the aircon vent, just to make sure it wasn’t blowing pollen inside their jeep. Vines draped overhead, caressing the roof like a prehistoric car wash. Ahead, the Trojan battlewagon ploughed through the undergrowth, following what remained of a motorway. Behind it, the other mercs trailed in their pickup trucks. Their headlights shone off the rusty skeleton of a lamppost, a crooked signpost displaying a faded, wordless warning.
Ahead, the canopy formed a solid wall blocking their path. The convoy slowed to a crawl, then firelight lit their surroundings. The Trojan battlewagon was spurting flamethrower fire over the jungle blockade.
“Wow,” Andy said. “Why don’t we have a flamethrower?”
“Where would we put one?” Clara said.
“I could carry it. Maybe just a little one.”
“Add it to the wishlist.”
Andy took a notepad out of the glovebox and marked it down. Inside were diagrams and descriptions of all the weapons he wanted, most of which he’d seen in games and movies.
“When are we gonna get a gravity cannon,” Andy said, pointing to a drawing he’d made near the beginning of the notepad. It was drawn in three frames like a comic book, depicting a stick figure Andy blasting an angry mutant off the page. “How cool would that be?”
“Yeah, I’m keeping my eyes out for one,” Clara said, but her voice sounded distant and distracted.
Each spurt from the flamethrower revealed more of the jungle. Andy caught glimpses of their surroundings, and his Combat Conceptualisation module worked to fill in the gaps. Another spurt of flame, and something looked wrong to Andy. The image seemed imperfect. Something had changed. As he shone a torch into the dark, the Trojan hissed and another spurt of flame roared forth. Something flinched in the firelight. A clump of moss shifted, growing in size and shrinking into the shadows. “Something just moved.”
Clara was alert, one hand on the wheel, one on the gear stick. “What we got?”
“Some sort of moss thing.”
“What’s it doing?”
“I don’t know.” The clump seemed to oscillate in the dark. It flitted like a lump of butter boiling in a pan, swelling and diminishing with each burst of flame. Andy checked on the Trojan. It had burnt a hole in the solid wall of vegetation. He could see a steel bridge now which had acted as a frame for the blockade, buried deep beneath the jungle. The plant life was too wet to catch alight and spread, forcing the battlewagon to burrow like a mole.
A horn screamed. Andy checked the wing mirror. Something loomed over one of the pickup trucks of the mercenaries following them. A shadow with blue specks.
The gearbox growled as Clara tried to reverse, but their truck wouldn’t drive. Something must have clogged the gearbox. His sister flinched as a thick limb-like vine slammed into the windscreen. They both drew their pistols in unison, but did not fire. If the creature was trying to get in, the worst thing they could do was create a hole for it.
“Flares,” Clara said, digging out her rucksack.
“Not sure that’ll cut it,” Andy said, tapping on his driver side window with the barrel of his 9mm. Tiny blue flowers sucked against the window like leeches as the clump of moss slowly enveloped their jeep. A crack appeared on Clara’s driver side window. Andy tasted the metallic tang of his Augmentation hormones firing, but couldn’t think of any of his abilities that would be useful. Clara pulled a flare out of her back and struck it, igniting a pink flame. Andy squinted as she pressed the flare against the window, singing tendrils that had begun to take root in the crack. The moss abetted, but for only a moment.
A vine burst through Andy’s window, shattering glass and grabbing his neck. He drew his knife and severed it, but the breach was already made. Moss bloomed in the opening, expanding inside their jeep, clutching and cracking the glass. Andy slung off his leather jacket and pressed it against the hole, shoving the moss back.
“Got anymore flares?” Andy said.
“In the boot.”
If he let go of the jacket now, they’d be swamped. “What about a grenade?”
“It’ll damage the jeep.”
“Fire? From the fuel canisters?”
“You wanna choke to death?”
Vines clutched to Andy’s wrists, dragging him through the glass. The moss swarmed in through the opening, blue flowers puckering and probing for flesh. When they latched onto his arms, he could feel their tiny teeth tugging at his skin. What a horrible way to die, death by a million needles. Andy slashed wildly with his knife, cutting the moss to ribbons, but let go of his jacket in the process. Andy snatched at the collar as his trusty leather friend was dragged out of the window, then something caught his eye inside a pocket–the drawing of a bear’s maw. The words ‘DESPERATION PERSPIRATION’ were written across a metallic can.
Sheathing his knife, Andy grabbed the can and sprayed it through the crack into the moss. “The flare,” he shouted. Clara leaned over and jammed the sizzling flare against the deodorant can’s muzzle. A burst of pink flame sprayed forward, drenching the window in fire. The moss creature hissed, sizzled and popped, tiny flowers burnt to a crisp.
“Woo!” Andy yanked his jacket back into the jeep and grabbed the flare from Clara. Shouldering the door open and sprayed his miniature pink flamethrower in a wide swath over the jeep. The moss shrivelled away, receding underfoot like a tide. The jeep revved, and Andy jumped back inside as Clara stuck it into gear and sped off. They drove in the Trojan’s smouldering wake beneath a tunnel of vines until they were out on the jungle road again. The battlewagon’s headlights had disappeared in the undergrowth, but their path of destruction was easy to follow.
Andy shook the can. About half of it remained. “Got enough for one more stop if you need a leak.”
Behind them, gunfire cracked, muffled by the jungle. Then a low boom.
“Damn,” Andy said. “I think our friends are struggling.
“Either they make it or they don’t.”
“Damn sis, cold.”
“Well we can’t turn around now, can we,” she snapped. “It’s not cold, it’s just the job.”
Andy had meant it as a compliment, but clearly she hadn’t got it. They caught up to the battlewagon as around them the dilapidated ruins of a city rose out of the undergrowth. The husks of brick buildings were seized by vines. A huge freight truck carried a cargo of fat headed mushrooms, gleaming with a viscous secretion. A steel gate stood poised, guarding nothing. Clumps of moss of every texture and colour dotted the roadside, clinging to signposts and derelict cars. Mist evaporated in their headlamps where, ahead, the Trojan had burned a path through the congestion, not wanting to get bogged down on the road again, ripe for another ambush.
Finally, after hours of cautious travel, the jungle opened up before them, stretching its tendrils over a wide, cluttered bridge. A cemetery of rusted vehicles were packed on the bridge, their oxidised orange hulls had been transformed into artsy plant pots by the spreading jungle. Spindly creepers wrapped around doors and window frames, joined by ferns, which sprouted from the vehicles’ sodden seat cushions. Moss coated the seams as though someone had gone over the car frames with a highlighter pen, filling in the cracks. There was a path through the vehicles where someone had pushed them aside, which the Trojan battlewagon was now widening with its beaked dozer blade.
Below them, the murky river gushed towards the coast. Beyond the bridge stood the silent city, shaded as the sun rose at its back. There were crops of trees on the opposite bank, but the type Andy had come to associate with this region of the world, not so much the killer-moss kind. It seemed that the jungle had failed to cross the wide river and conquer the city streets beyond it.
Clara parked their jeep at the edge of the bridge as the Trojan waded through the wreckages.
“Let’s wait for them here,” Clara said. “Give them a chance to catch up.”
Andy got out and stretched his legs. His passenger side was cracked beyond the repair of any tool other than heavens sent duct tape. He fetched a roll from the boot and started to repair the damages, applying the tape like bandages over holes and cracks in the glass. After a few more minutes, Andy heard the sound of engines approaching from behind. Two pickup trucks staggered out onto the road stained green from veggie juices, their windows and bonnets shattered and battered.
“Good,” Clara said. “I was worried we were working with amateurs.”
Andy unscrewed his hip flask and took a sip, then offered some to his sister, which for once, she accepted. “Yeah, we’ll see.”