3 Shell

"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality…"

- Queen

My first impression of the shed we were stuck in then, was that it's a shit pit.

My second glance, on being led back by our 'death squad', is that it's still a shit pit, covered in harvested debris and discarded forestry. Some of that discarded wood looked hacked and covered in blood, held by the hands of prisoners with more ragged prison wear.

"Okay, it's a bit of a bush pit," Spoke Clyde, as we examined the various junk and primitive weapons lying around this shed, "Be glad we have human ingenuity among our crafters to make up for the lack of modern gear, let alone social media by our glorious masters."

I looked over at Clyde, who was completely unfazed at our impending doom, "What you see is what we managed to keep in hand over all the scrap we got from the raid."

I looked around the shed. All that's there are medieval blades at best, crudely made weaponry at worst.

"If you see a stray sword or bow, try to use it if possible even if you can't keep it when our wonderful forces take medieval-era weapons for 'research' purposes."

"More they want us to die unarmed," Another voice snarked in a funny foreign accent. I looked over to the source, seeing bronze skin and a cheery smile as he cut a stick with a stray piece of scrap iron.

"Oh, he's Antonio Garcia," Clyde said, Antonio grimacing over that comment.

"Antônio. Just call me Garcia, if you can't say my first name right," Antonio, or Garcia said in a funny tone.

I mentally tried to roll the 'o' in his name, one I recall feeling dissonance to pronouncing it right until it was too late for him.

"We're lucky to have bush crafters like Garcia on the sidelines. If you want actual usable bows and traps? Keep him safe," Clyde spoke. I looked at the stuff made and lying around this mess of a shed, and thought to myself: 'Could I make this well?' A thought I solemnly nodded to.

"As you can clearly hear, we're left for dead as expected with severe casualties," Clyde said with a tired face, everyone sharing a grim chuckle, "On the bright side, what we lack in gear, Harper hopes we'll make up with human ingenuity on our side. The sort that our society would never hire us for, clearly. Ha ha ha…"

"But beyond the lack of firearms in this foreign sun mess. Well…" Clyde paused, I saw him troubled with a more tired expression, "Survive in this hellhole long enough, and we need only look at Petro Volkov as a good example."

My guide pointed to a heavily scarred man without hair, looking like an overly jacked-up bodybuilder, "Heard he survived a blaze, at one point. But that's hearsay when he's less likely to die than our lot."

"Less likely?" I said, as I looked at how Petro was silent, as he glared at me, sending a chill down my spine. Clyde just tapped me in the back, to steer me away from staring at him.

"Even if you get lucky enough to have abs that resist a peasant blade, all it takes to die is one knight in shining armour charging at us. Then we're all fucking fucked."

"If that's the best, I'd dread to think how bad it can get…" I froze when I felt a cold hand rest on my shoulders. I turned to stare at a wide-eyed madman, his crazed, glazed eyes visible through a grinning wooden mask.

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"Welcome, [FRIEND] to your doom~" He sang, his voice jublant, "Do you feel the joy joy joy joy, of your fated death? Your own penalty, down through your spine~?"

"Or how even if you struggle for society, when said society wants you dead~?" That freak sang, freaking me out with how his hug was much tighter than dead Blake's. I struggled to freak out, even when I felt his eye leer close to my ear, "So save none, live to kill, kill them all. Wow…"

I was fortunately let go before Clyde could even try to pry the lunatic out. Who just laughed and danced away, in an almost unnatural prose. A sight I could only think grimly on, being stuck with a half-assed clown of a lunatic.

"So, you go mad?" I spoke, still on guard as the masked man jerked his direction back in my face.

"You won't go mad, like me. Nor will you die, like dirt… You're gonna crawl~, like a worm. Gonna get squished, like a bug~. CAW CAW CAW!" The lunatic danced away, fixing me a menacing stance as I couldn't help but stare at the mask.

"Suppose so," Clyde spoke, exhaling as he looked stressed when I turned my gaze to my guide, "That, is Bernard."

He avoided looking at Bernard, as if he didn't want to look at the 'clown' himself.

A masked man that still laughed like a crow, at us. That was eerily, not unnerving to me then. When I felt Clyde's hand rest on my shoulder.

"Try not to piss off Bernard, if you even can piss him off - he's Harper's right-hand man. One bonafide psycho who, well... went bananas after one too many painful ringings, fucked his brains up."

"I got good news news news, down in my ears. Drown in my ears IN PAIN! Ahahaha~" I had one look at the singing madman, whose head tilted at us oddly. Then tilted to another side, as he leapt to hassle another group of prisoners.

"Also, don't catch his interest. He loves to gloat on our despair in wanting us all dead equally," Clyde said, his voice tired as he led me elsewhere. Near where 'Antonio' and such were crafting improvisational spears and bows.

"There's a few more names. Like oh, Ellen and Leon. Claire and Chris. But you'll pick their names up if they survive enough. Assuming, you don't die, or they're already dead. Hahaha…." I did not think much about my guide's statement at the time when I felt a handle pressed on a stray hand of mine, "Here. It's a native knife. Too small for combat but better than bare hands, and useful for crafting at least some wooden spikes if needed."

I had a look at the blade which looked more like a peasant's sharp knife than some improvised shiv. I just shrugged as I got into shaving off pieces at the ends of every stick, forming rough spikes as I cut methodologically.

By the time I got my hands on a big, thick piece of stick and shaved it into a primitive spear without a proper spearhead, my hands ached in excruciating pain, red with blisters, worse than the hungry rumblings of my half-empty stomach.

I felt a bit of primal joy over making a weapon from a hand-me-down tool. I heard clapping from Clyde.

"Guess you're getting used to it." He said to me over my shoulder, grabbing the stack of sticks over to Garcia who gave me a thumbs up.

"You're doing quite good there, newbie," Garcia told me, leaping over with something of a sling bag out of leaves holding some spikes, "Here's a bag, don't mind the crudeness. If you can find any, grab those yellow spikey berries. It's more poisonous than the inedible ones. As in, it can leave prey breathless better than the ones that give the shits like poor Larry."

"Maybe if we have time, I can help you out in making an improvisational bag for the rest of us. Gotta carry those-"

"ATTENTION!" A loud shout caught my attention. And right there, was a group of soldiers, led by the angry sergeant that wanted us dead.

"ATTENTION SCUM!" He screamed, soldiers actively aiming their firearms at us, as I noticed everyone stopped cutting sticks, to stare at our military, "We're going on a raid, tonight…"

"You know what that means?" The sergeant leaned towards Harper, who looked unnerved even with his stoic expression, "You can smile now, for your atonement has come, scum! MOVE OUT! SHARP!"

One harsh turn from the sergeant, followed by guns pointing at the entrance led to Harper walking out with a bag and steel in hard without an ounce of hesitance.

"Let's go guys. Grab your kit and follow me. Before the death squad performs clean up," Harper stated as he marched out of that mess of a camp we're stuck in.

I kept what stuff I crafted in hand, as everyone else followed suit with what they could carry. To a roll call to our impending deaths.

To us survivors, it was a miracle in hindsight we survived that mess of a raid. Even if we felt safe in foresight on how it was 'just' a peasant village, with a 'small' chance of bullshit wizard.

Not knowing how useless, escape is. When we're forever marked for death with eyes all on us from the start. Especially by those wizards, who viewed our dystopian society, as a threat to be purged from existence...