In the church a crude wooden effigy of a brown-haired girl stood on the sanctuary. Father Isaac sprinkled it with holy water as he prayed for the soul of Jessica Wright. If they could not recover her body for burial, then this would suffice. A chill wind blew in from the highest window in the church, opened wide to let in her ghost.

Usually they'd do this for lumberjacks, hunters or fishermen, men who'd accepted they'd likely die on the job for the good of the village. But never in the history of their village had a child died such a lonely death.

The doors swung wide open. Carter rushed in and jumped on the sanctuary, raising a quarterstaff overhead, trembling with rage and fury.

Father Isaac shoved herself between her and clawed at her staff in an attempt at disarming her. Nevertheless Carter tried to swing her staff at the effigy but missed.

She readied her staff for another attempt but she missed again. Father Isaac winced as it struck his shoulder with a heavy tap.

"What's the matter with you?!" he shouted, blocking another hit.

"I'll get her back-" Carter mouthed.

"She's gone-" said Isaac as he tried to push her away.

"No she's not!" Carter yelled as she drove the head of her staff into his side.

Isaac wheezed and stumbled. He yelped as Carter hit him again, knocking him to his knees.

"I-I'll find her" Carter said between heavy breaths.

A loud crack sounded through the church as Carter's staff met the effigy. Splinters flew.

Gritting her teeth, she bashed the effigy again. It creaked as it keeled to the left.

What are you doing? Isaac thought as his body roared in pain. Carter's sobs echoed through the room.

"Carter..." Isaac said softly. "It's been two weeks."

"I w-want her back..." Carter sobbed.

Isaac stood up, unsure of what to say. Snowflakes melted on his back. He looked behind his shoulder.

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Outside the breeze blew in harder. As its howl reached a crescendo the wind sprinkled the church with snow.

An explosion rocked the village. Sawdust rained from the ceiling. Beams shifted. Planks squealed. Bricks cracked. Houses collapsed. In the distance they could hear the palisade's ropes snapping.

Both stopped to look out the window, frozen in shock. In the distance a pillar rose up towards the heavens like the Tower of Babel. In texture it looked a bit like a cloud, but its colour was brown as mud. A strong and sudden wind came from its direction, bringing with it a heavy fog of soil, dust, and gravel.

...

Rewind a few minutes ago:

Hekkatomb reclined on his swivel chair in the middle of his filthy office, an enormous cigar sticking out the side of his mouth. Right by him on his desk stood a tall bottle of booze. He kicked off the floor a bit. Half-eaten chip bags crunched and crinkled as the wheels of his chair backed over them.

"Yep, I've got his signature. Now their land is ours!" Hekkatomb said into his reflective black flip phone. "And there's nothing the feds can do about it!"

"Excellent!" said a smooth and exuberant voice from the phone. "On that note, right now I've got our troublesome adversary en route to our newly-acquired territories!"

"Your eggheads give him a hard time?" Hekkatomb smirked.

"Well, if that isn't the understatement of the century!" the voice said. "Rest assured, he will be positively tenderized by the hour of your arrival."

"Fine and dandy." Hekkatomb grunted through a toothy snarl. "I ought to be paying you for the pleasure of ripping his guts out like a botched piñata!"

"Hekkatomb, I'm afraid I don't get the allegory-"

"Boss, you know when you whack a piñata real hard and most of the candy falls out but there's still some left, but you can't be bothered to hit it again so you drag the rest of the candy out with your hands - do you do that?"

"No...?"

"It's kinda like that!" Hekkatomb barked. "So uh, the fruit, how do I get it?"

"In this Zone there's this unremarkable little girl-" said Hekkatomb's boss.

"Got it. Which one?"

"...Right now it's a bit hard to tell her apart from the other natives-"

"-the Sparkledogs?"

"...Yes, the Sparkledogs. It's part of her destiny, so I've heard. But she's the Chosen One so she shouldn't be so inconspicuous by now."

"Anything I should look out for?"

"If she snuck up from you from behind and you saw her right there she'd give you a seizure-"

"-Like the rest of them?"

"...Like the rest of them, yes. To my knowledge she's the only one looking for the Fruit, so it should be easy all things considered."

"Got it, boss!" said Hekkatomb, instinctively saluting.

An explosion roared in the distance. A shockwave rattled everything in the room. Hekkatomb snatched up the bottle of whiskey that'd strayed too close to the edge of his desk and quaffed it all in one gulp.

"Oh, I love that sound!" slurred Hekkatomb, "You know what that means!"

"I sure do! Have a good time!" said his boss. The phone beeped.

Hekkatomb continued to drawl. "Welp, see you in a while, in the meantime I'll see how many pieces of him I can fit in my fanny pack - *BURP*"

He got up. As he walked through the door he tore it off its hinges with the force of his torso.