Snippet #1971676

Clank.

Clank.

Clank.

Milo had long since faded into a trance, seeing and hearing little but the dirt beneath his feet and the rattle of the chain binding him to a hundred other unlucky souls. Even the creeping dread that the impending journey through the Ruins had once stirred in him had faded to a dull anxiety in the face of hunger, dehydration, and exhaustion. The manacles around Milo's wrists were uncomfortably tight, as the slavers had no bigger size to accommodate them, and the back of his neck was perpetually itchy. No doubt only because it was one of the many spots he couldn't reach with his constricted hands. The discomfort of the journey had long since plateaued, and Milo no longer really noticed the buzzing flies, the stench of unwashed bodies, or the horrendously itchy facial hair. All that was on his mind was how painfully dry his tongue was and the hole where his stomach used to be. Milo worked his jaw idly, unsticking his tongue from the roof of his mouth. It was an unpleasant sensation. He was aware of a sort of pasty, ill-tasting residue coating his palate that was no doubt a bad sign, and the hunger pangs had become almost cripplingly severe. One of the slavers in particular, a small and seedy man by the name of Johno, took extreme pleasure in tormenting the bigger captives. He would deny them food and drink for the pettiest of perceived slights, or if he was feeling particularly cruel, for no reason at all. His beatings came out of the blue and were displays of barbaric, unrestrained fury. Johno would carry on for thirty minutes at a time, spittle flecking his lips and his eyes frenzied like those of an animal. Milo had often been on receiving end of Johno's mad fits back when he had the strength to deal with them. He used to help out the smaller, weaker folks. Give them a little food, a hand up, things like that. Unfortunately, solidarity among slaves was the first step to rebellion, and Johno took particular pleasure in breaking Milo of any altruistic habits.

Milo found himself pulled from his fugue when he felt an abrupt yank on his chains and found himself sprawled on rubble-strewn dirt. They had only just entered the 'city limits' of the Ruins and already things seemed to be going wrong. Johno, that ever-eager bane of his existence, practically squealed with glee as he descended upon Milo.

"Get up! Up, you lazy shit-for-brains piece of filth! I said UP!"

Naturally the wretched man screamed all this in a single breath before enthusiastically working Milo over with the whip, which made it all the harder for the young man to actually rise. When he did successfully heave himself up, Milo found that his task had been so difficult in part because the man in front of him was completely limp and a dead weight on the slack of the chain.

"Oh for fucks sake, did he faint or some shit?"

Johno gave the man a sound crack with the whip, to no effect. A few nudges with the toe of his boot, as well as a delicate kick to the groin, did just as little to rouse the man. Johno seemed reluctant to touch the man, and seemed to figure he had done enough.

"Dead. Fucking wonderful! Gaven! GAVEN! Unlock the chain and stir those lard-arse guards. We gotta get this body off the line and I don't want any god damn runners. Not in this godforsaken hellhole"

He punctuated his statement by spitting loudly on the corpse, fixing one of the female slaves with a leering grin. As far as Milo knew, Johno never forced himself on them, but that didn't stop him from being a right creep when he felt like it. The caravan was halted and the chain undone. Fifteen heavily armed guards positioned themselves along the line, eying the prisoners. No one had the energy to attempt an escape, but the slavers were practiced and vigilant, never letting their cargo go unwatched.

In the meantime, Milo took in his surroundings with a sort of idle I'm-probably-dead-or-worse-anyway sort of lethargy. The almost mythical Ruins. As far as Milo knew, no one had been here in centuries, though that didn't stop horror stories about ghasts and monsters and Scavengers from circulating all across the Wasteland. Trade caravans in particular usually had an interesting and always "honst-to-god true" story to tell about this place. Nasty stuff. Milo didn't really believe the legends, but there was no denying that the place was eerie. For miles around there were fragments of buildings and statues, half-buried and overgrown. Even worse, here within the actual borders of the city there were many nearly whole buildings left. They stood crookedly over shattered roads, many with their steel skeletons on perverse display. It was more than unnerving, especially since even the slightest breeze would echo and groan in the absolutely most startling way. Milo could see where the ghost stories and all had come from. Anyone spending half a second in this fucking place would run for the hills thinking god knows what was after them.

There wasn't much time for him to contemplate this tragic monument to the past because several things happened in quick succession. Several more slaves collapsed, bringing Milo to his knees under the sudden weight of their bodies, and a slaver crumpled forward, his gun discharging with an ear-splitting crack and peppering a cadaver with bullets. Chaos broke out, with slaves tripping over each other trying to fruitlessly flee and slave drivers firing blindly into the ruins, looking to kill whoever was picking off them and their cargo. In a matter of seconds, almost all the slaves were dead. There was but one slaver left, and he appeared catatonic, his gun clicking softly as he repeatedly pulled the trigger without reloading.

Milo himself was more than a little shaken. He was still kneeling, struggling to comprehend what had just happened. Several minutes passed in silence but for that quietly echoing clicking before Milo roused himself to action. Unexpected things happened all the time out on the high seas. Knowing what best to do was not always possible, but doing nothing was for sure never the answer. First, Milo attempted to stand. It took some effort, but he managed it by first shoving the dead bodies in front and back of him away a bit to give himself some slack. The noise did not appear to have any effect on the slaver, who continued his rhythmic trigger-pulling unabated. The more Milo moved around, the better he felt. It was odd, really. He ascribed it to adrenaline, but Milo had apparently found new strength in the face of malnutrition and sleep deprivation.

Milo looked around, noticing that a few of the slaves were still moving around. Still alive. They all seemed to be chained further back than him, so for the moment he turned his back to them and focused on the dead slavers. One of them had been instructed to unlock the chain. One of them clutched in his still-warm fingers the keys to freedom. Slowly, and with great effort, Milo began pulling the chain and the many dozens of still-attached corpses towards the slavers. Impossible, impossible. And yet here he was. The adrenaline theory still held. Didn't people do all sorts of crazy things when nature called upon them to save their own skins? And yet Milo felt...different. Maybe it was the shock, but...No. Not the time to speculate. Looking back, Milo parted his lips. All that came out at first was a dry cough, but he tried again, keeping one eye on the surviving slaver the entire time.

"Help me pull this chain towards forward. One of the slavers has keys"

He had only just gotten the words out when a new sound rang out from deeper in the Ruins. A brief, metallic skittering noise, like a massive metal spider running across a table. Milo froze up, eyes wide. So this was what pure, primal panic felt like. Again, that sounds. It was awful. Whatever it was, it seemed to move in short bursts, and was apparently alone. There was the dusty clatter of rubble, and then....the thing. The animal? It was definitely not a human. At least, not anymore.

The Scavenger was humanoid in shape, but it's arms and fingers seemed unusually long. It's entire back was a patchwork of metal and wires, and the tips of all it's fingers gleamed in the pale sunlight. Milo couldn't tell if they were sharp or not, nor was he particularly eager to find out. A row of thin rods arced along it's spine, occasionally sparking with electricity. As Milo watched, it crept towards one of the slave corpses. Sniffing, prodding, and then (with a suddenness that made Milo taste bile) tearing into the arm of the recently dead woman. Milo gagged, and the thing very suddenly looked up at him. When it made eye contact, it was even worse than watching it feed on someone who had been alive all of ten minutes ago. It's eyes were clearly human, but they had no depth. There was nothing there. Not hunger, not anger or fear or hate or want. It was eating mechanically, to live. It would just as emotionlessly kill Milo, or cut off it's own arm, if that was what it needed to do to survive. Those calculating, hollow eyes remained locked on to Milo's for a beat longer, and then it went back to eating. Milo noted with a sort of detached horror that some of its teeth appeared to be metal as well, and oddly shaped. The Scavenger wrenched the arm off with an almost casual lack of effort and retreated a ways to continue its meal. The surviving slaver did not appear to notice.

"We seriously need to get the fuck out of here right goddamn now"

His whisper was as hoarse as before, but now a tad more urgent. Milo resumed pulling on the chain, his momentary glimpse into the creatures place-where-a-heart-should-be making him confident that it wouldn't go after him while it was eating. It wasn't an animal after all. It had no curiosity, no aggression. It fed, it scavenged, it survived. Nothing more. Milo had barely made any progress when another noise shivered out from the bowels of the Ruins, thin and grating. He could practically see it quivering in the air. A horrible, piercing screech. The thing, the Scavenger, raised its pale head and called right back. Again and again, this back-and-forth exchange continued for something like two minutes. When it was done, the Scavenger went back to ripping apart the mangled arm. A terrible certainty filled Milo as he looked back at the other survivors.

"We have to hurry"

His voice almost broke, the sheer terror making it hard to speak calmly. All he could do was imagine those lopsided, glinting teeth sinking into his flesh.

"They're coming"