Introduction
The world is drastically different in 2030. Humanity has collapsed in on itself. Its no longer about politics or ethics--just survival. The world is a hostile, and dangerous place. Titan as it was officially labeled back when the world had an education system and proud scholars, was once a lush verdant world filled with natural life and beauty. A colony of Earth's until Earth was besieged and laid to waste by an alien force and left Titan and its sister planet "Themis" unperturbed. Named after the "God of Good Council" these two planets, with the last remaining human populations saw it as not an opportunity to regather, to coalesce and prosper--but to compete, bicker and argue.
With 2020 passing the world quickly, the globe saw an interaction with the digital age it had never seen before. While electronics were in the infancy still in the early 2000's, by the time of 2025 technological gains came by leaps and bounds. There had always been spaceships, but menial freighters loaded with materials, goods and supplies.
But "Titan", named after the old Greek Gods that were cast into a fictional hell called "Tartarus" built a heavy weapons platform. A warship. They called it "Chronus" after the father of Zeus. It was of a completely different class which they labeled"Accron". Of course with this accomplishment, Themis could not be outdone. They had fears that Titan was going to use its new-found power to conquer and even enslave Themis to its doctrine. So, as the years crawled by Themis was secretly underwraps and finally unveiled the Savior-Class Battlecruiser "Manifest Destiny".
These ships became flagships for the ever increasing armada between the two words. The human race could no longer function in its divided state. The two powers vying for absolute supremacy were on the verge of total, and all out war. The potential for catastrophic loss of life on both ends, both sides saw it as a Cold War. This time however, ether was open hostilities spilling out from both sides. Mass riots, and schemes such as coup d'états that were sloppily misinformed as charades of either governments. However, as the games grew more elaborate and the choices more devious--the finger over the proverbial trigger set off a chain of events long foreseen, perhaps, long overdue.
In 2030 the colonies Titan And Themis engaged each other in a heated and drawn own battle. They had no other planets in which to target but each other. In doing so, they each did irreconcilable damage to the other. Eventually though, Themis lost the war, and with it, its entire civilization. Titan was left barren wasteland of desserts; cracked and dried earth and sandy dunes. The once vast metropolises that dotted the land scape, were now buried in debris from warheads, missiles, shells and bombs. Skeletons of buildings and the city blocks they once resided are now a distant memory. Over the course of a hundred years, the inhabitants have adapted to a lifestyle that in prior generations had never dreamed of. A world without electronics being the focal point of their lives any longer.
Some of the superstructures of the battleships--immense heralds of destruction--can be found still docked and eerily groaning as if still enduring the stresses of combat. Some of these ships show their incredible tenacity with entire compartments and decks blown out--tungsten carbide twisted like tin foil. No one seems to want to go near them, even a hundred years after their war ended, them memory somehow passing through the genetic line or perhaps just permeate the area with a sense of dread and awesomeness.
The rest of the world, it is a hollowed out wasteland. Silence and serenity can quickly become something more however. Radiation, manifested by the many bombs dropped by both sides, has produced startling abhorrent and grotesque creatures. What remains of the population after carnage of world bombardments; entire city's sinking in a deluge of immense artillery strikes that reshaped entire continents.
* This is subject to change at my discretion.
With 2020 passing the world quickly, the globe saw an interaction with the digital age it had never seen before. While electronics were in the infancy still in the early 2000's, by the time of 2025 technological gains came by leaps and bounds. There had always been spaceships, but menial freighters loaded with materials, goods and supplies.
But "Titan", named after the old Greek Gods that were cast into a fictional hell called "Tartarus" built a heavy weapons platform. A warship. They called it "Chronus" after the father of Zeus. It was of a completely different class which they labeled"Accron". Of course with this accomplishment, Themis could not be outdone. They had fears that Titan was going to use its new-found power to conquer and even enslave Themis to its doctrine. So, as the years crawled by Themis was secretly underwraps and finally unveiled the Savior-Class Battlecruiser "Manifest Destiny".
These ships became flagships for the ever increasing armada between the two words. The human race could no longer function in its divided state. The two powers vying for absolute supremacy were on the verge of total, and all out war. The potential for catastrophic loss of life on both ends, both sides saw it as a Cold War. This time however, ether was open hostilities spilling out from both sides. Mass riots, and schemes such as coup d'états that were sloppily misinformed as charades of either governments. However, as the games grew more elaborate and the choices more devious--the finger over the proverbial trigger set off a chain of events long foreseen, perhaps, long overdue.
In 2030 the colonies Titan And Themis engaged each other in a heated and drawn own battle. They had no other planets in which to target but each other. In doing so, they each did irreconcilable damage to the other. Eventually though, Themis lost the war, and with it, its entire civilization. Titan was left barren wasteland of desserts; cracked and dried earth and sandy dunes. The once vast metropolises that dotted the land scape, were now buried in debris from warheads, missiles, shells and bombs. Skeletons of buildings and the city blocks they once resided are now a distant memory. Over the course of a hundred years, the inhabitants have adapted to a lifestyle that in prior generations had never dreamed of. A world without electronics being the focal point of their lives any longer.
Some of the superstructures of the battleships--immense heralds of destruction--can be found still docked and eerily groaning as if still enduring the stresses of combat. Some of these ships show their incredible tenacity with entire compartments and decks blown out--tungsten carbide twisted like tin foil. No one seems to want to go near them, even a hundred years after their war ended, them memory somehow passing through the genetic line or perhaps just permeate the area with a sense of dread and awesomeness.
The rest of the world, it is a hollowed out wasteland. Silence and serenity can quickly become something more however. Radiation, manifested by the many bombs dropped by both sides, has produced startling abhorrent and grotesque creatures. What remains of the population after carnage of world bombardments; entire city's sinking in a deluge of immense artillery strikes that reshaped entire continents.
- Full Name(Last, Middle Initial, first)
- ::Job Description:: (Merchant, Bounty Hunter, Soldier of Fortune, Marshal, Prostitute, etc. Within reason. )
- ::Weight::( I want reasonable proportions. Not everyone's going to be 6'9 298lbs. No less than 5'7 feet tall or more than 6'6. If you need a height x weight ratio, http://www.healthchecksystems.com/heightweightchart.htm )
- ::Height::
- ::Eye Color::
- :: Hair color:: ( This may not seem important, but it helps with people wanting to know a descriptive measure of your character without having to read through four paragraphs of other details.)
- :: General Description:: (This is where you should add in the finer details, as well as rehash some of the material. Be descriptive, use adjectives, don't be scared! Although, make sure its details that are actually relevant. Rather or not your male or female character has nipple piercings, I just don't care. If he has a scar, tell me where and why.)[/b]
- ::Background:: Details, details, details.
- ::Weapon:: ( will fill everyone in on this subject later as to what the actual firearms are. As I have stated beforehand, its unrealistic to expect someone to be toting a "laser gun". However conventional firearms will be of the time frame, they may be still "kinetic based" weaponry, weapons that eject or propel rounds with kinetic force but there are instances where other technology is included. )
- ::Vehicle:: There are many vehicles through out this world, in most cases they will be military. Some your character will be able to drive such as armored transports such as JLTV (successor of what today we know as the Humvee), and even the VOTL, a former military aircraft that was a successor to the helicopter. Most vehicles will be civilian use though, as there is no gas you can pump any more, its pretty much first come first serve.
Character Template
* This is subject to change at my discretion.
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The Story So Far... Write a Post » as written by 4 authors
Setting
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~~~Introduction~~~
Twinkle twinkle little star...how I wonder, where you are...
The skies had for so long, been polluted with a nuclear winter clouding everything with a shroud. Like God had finally seen enough of their disastrous ways that he forsook them and built a wall of ash--a testament to their sins, the makings of their own perpetual Hell. In truth however, they were the ones to bring it upon themselves. Human's he meant. Their conceited hearts eternally lusted for more and more. The good. The better. The best. It was always something more to feed their psychological addictions. Money, drugs, whores--love. They had consented to a slavery that was never a part of the original bargain but would become, in later years, a necessity.
The common book was a surprising if under utilized tool. No formal education existed these days. They just went with what worked and passed the job to their progeny when they were gone or too old to carry on. There were a few cases where, in a stroke of genius something good would come from an inventive mind. But for Cain, a book was a highly prized commodity. It was invaluable. It was because he had eidetic memory. From all the places he had been--and he had been to very many he could tell what kind of surroundings he would be in, where he would need to crawl, to rappel, to jump--to run in the case of some freakishly large mutant that needed a rocket launcher rather than 5.56 that probably felt more like bb's bouncing off its abhorrent calloused skin. Most people in these wastelands didn't understand the concept of a map, let alone know really how to use one. Cain would never admit to not knowing fully how one was read. He simply always told the companies "Point it out her on the map, and I will go there." He never said to them, what coordinates were there--longitude or latitude--that would confuse people. Hell it would confuse Cain and Cain got a bit hot tempered when he felt stupid. Within a reasonable five mile degree of accuracy--he always did find his specified spot.
Cain knew, what perhaps--no one else would ever know. They were alone. It was a failing existence for humanity. A skeleton of what it had been--what it should have been. It started with broken promises; Leaders elected to protect, to serve to bring harmony and peace and stability. Ronald Haymond was an elected official to the highest office of power; swept on wings of gilded applause at first. He promised a new a way of life and with a silver tongue, had set in motion the collapse of humanity itself. He cut off American exports that were highly prized, built blockade fences around the lines of engagement and then, then he hunkered down.
The Earth originally was one people. Their voices--young and old--singing praises to him for being a Phoenix amongst the ashes. He had read how this Ronald made promised and promised again, and always delivered.One would think that, he was a great leader. When in fact he had broken every civil liberty, every law and human rights. The segregation was now no longer just faced on the blacks or the Hispanics or the Asians--they were ordered to brutally shoot on sight mixed races.
Spare them sometime maybe? Though not all whites were for it, and they put a bullet into them just as easily.
It was a purge and would later become The Great Pogrom. The remainder; Hispanics, Asians, Blacks--were all segregated it was more like a set-up for a massacre and it was. What could one do against the machinations of fate? Stay and be abused, mistreated, malnourished? The first star-ships came not from the mighty conglomerations that had flocked to Ronald's supports in the billions.
The Pioneers as they were called, a mixture of ethnics that escaped persecution by self exile--settled on Titan and Themis. They produced their own form of governments. Yet another fatal flaw. The two sides often, if not eagerly attracted the ire of the other. Humanity was a ticking time bomb, just waiting, ticking the seconds, the minutes, the hours and the days down until...finally it imploded.
Now they were left with rolling thick clouds of venomous, irradiated showers that were like acid. The sun that did pierce the thick blanket smog was unshielded and would not only give a surge of radiation but would burn unsuspecting, unaware travelers to simple ash. That was why the would was a virtual desert now. These pockets were mostly mapped out, but no one could tell when the winds would change and allow more access. Barely drinkable water, abhorrent creatures that were twisted beyond himself from the simple fact that if they hadn't died out right--there incessant breeding produced progeny worse than their worst nightmares. Some human females were raped to the same effect.
Even eaten by their newborn monstrosities. In fact, he was indeed a hybrid. But the mutations were constantly growing. The reason for his extraordinary strength, comparable to a silverback gorilla--enabling him to easily break, squeeze, tear off and move incredibly heavy objects. The cause of this mutation? The hyper condensed muscles in his arms and legs. Nearly four times as hard as a humans would be of a comparable growth. This meant that while he certainly didn't look any bigger or stronger--he was actually both. This highly dense bundle of musculature that has attached to an equally impressive hardened skeletal frame allowed him to be six times the strength of any normal, every day man.
This was a frightening concept to be sure. An entirely overpowering humanoid that could not only shoot a gun--but could literally crush a man's skull terrified the locales. The fact that he could see in the dark--although they were never truly aware of just how well-- it nevertheless, unnerved them to see his feats in complete darkness. Simply his acuity with the senses themselves; on several occasions mobs had tried to essentially ambush Caine, only to find that his animal-like tendencies and natural gifts made him very astute. He could smell them even though they didn't have a particularly pungent aroma--none that a normal human could smell. He also has surround sound hearing, meaning he can flex the small bones in his ears to accurately tune in to hear even a heart beating.
Even his mouth could relay things like temperature differences, sensing from both sides of the head and following trails based on chemical cues is called tropotaxis like the rattlesnake. His teeth's dentin and enamel had super hardened and even though they looked like a humans teeth still, there were serrated ridges, like small steak knives even on his molars. This made flesh a prime target over anything else. Human. Animal. Mutant. Flesh was flesh to him. His jaw was unlike a humans as well. It was designed more like a Rottweilers, in the function that it could essentially "lock" into place. But this had a devastating effect to whatever he had a hold of in his mouth. Snapping his jaws shut, he had a bite force enough to snap the femur of a human leg.
He did have several drawbacks. One being a true albino, he could not endure the sunlight on his bare skin, it was why when he was younger he dwelt within the slums of shanty towns and lived inside the ruins like this city like a ghost. It provided much needed shelter from the sun's UV rays. While not nearly as potent as it formally was due to the nuclear winter from the fallout of the war--to him as an Albino, it was very similar to turning an arc welder loose on human flesh. The effects can speak for themselves. Large, painful blisters that can quickly go from some the size of a dime, to covering his whole backside in several cases that left disfiguring scars.
Another was his mutation itself. While being highly adaptive its progressive effects could be decisively seen all over his body. In the scars that littered it. He would begin to mutate secondary limbs or some other extra appendage and he simply, cut it off. Though make no mistake, he bled heavily, and the pain was excruciating. It was a source of severe contempt and disdain for Cain. Moreover, if he allowed it to progress past the initial stages of growth there was no telling what the effects would be. For Cain, it would feel like he would be lost in a conglomeration of grotesque, abhorrent mutations.
It all was a pain in Cain's ass. Without his armor he would slowly roast like a dog on a spit fire. That charcoal colored meat; crunchy yet gamey.
Eyes moved behind a shield of black, a veil to cover what lay behind them in a self-made seclusion. Carmine colored eyes stared down a narrow corridor, where the lights flickered. Every human sense; smelling, tasting, feeling, hearing, seeing clawed at what might have been a perceived threat. The floor groaned beneath his weight. The apartment complex having been emptied for decades, or so one would think. But there were threats still to be had here; mutated creations from years of radiation sickness and the rotting, decaying dead that roamed most everywhere else. Mindless in their pursuit of an endless hunger they lingered in a world where they no longer were sufficient. Despite these hazards, the sweat that crept and crawled along Cain's nape was not from fear, but from his own human exhaustion.
Days they had scoured the cities. Cities that yet held bounties, troves of weapons waiting to be unlocked if one were simply able to. The growing queasiness in his stomach was from days of not eating. This was deliberate. For the company he worked for now, ironically labeled ' Hunter's Delight' had sent with him a supervisor to make sure he performed admirably. Little did this man know of the beauty and the affliction that he was. He WAS man's worst friend and that was about become painfully and evidently clear. The man was stalwart alright, he could give him that. But the pure and simple truth was, this was about politics. A Hunter's Delight was a stiff competitor, and they were out to get their hands on equipment that 'Grenadiers' felt was theirs.
He understood it. He didn't care either way. Yet, there had to be an existential reason why he was doing what he was. The truth of that matter was--he was hunting his own man. He pushed on for days and didn't let him feed. So the man's own body had now become, progressively, a source of his own self destruction. But he didn't even know it yet. The man simply thought he was along for the ride, that, they would obtain the items with no problems. They would shoot a few rounds off and everyone would go home happy.
Isn't that a little cliche?
Moreover, where did this company get off sending a babysitter with a proven expeditionary? He was hurt. Truly. They would pay for all that shame. All that rage he felt welling up in him like blood to a fresh cut. Like tears being brought to the eyes when something unexpected happened. Cain would however, abide his time, creating sounds where there was none, making gesture to commence everything the man's right mind to believe, without a doubt, that there was movement. A panic stricken mind was a weak mind. Skittish like a deer in an abrupt blinding light, it would freeze even the most battle hardened if given the opportunity. It would cause seasoned veterans to seize, to tense the muscle and to hasten the heart.
He played on this element a great deal. Watching his contemporary sweat, not just from exhaustion or hunger that needed to be satiated--but from fear Cain licked his lips in a sequestered manner. He gestured to his comrade that they partake in sharing a room for the night. He agreed. Letting his XM8 slouch, he took his Remington 870 from the back holster that was slanted across one shoulder and in true form kicked the door in and cleared the room. Waving his compatriot in and with hastened glee, he ushered in shutting the door behind him and they both sealed the room off.
Cain opened the nearby window, revealing the darkness of night outside. He did so for two reasons: One it could let them hear of any approaching shambling, diseased ridden 'corpses' were nearby or that any mutant creatures loud enough were in the area as well. Secondly he was preparing to cook. Much to the delight of the distressed soldier now under the illusion that he was okay; he most certainly was not. Someone once said that the only thing to fear was fear itself; they had oddly enough not met Cain.
He rambled through the cupboards finding a decent sized pot. The apartments power source had been in relapse for years now. While that meant it was unsustainable as far as living comforts were concerned, it did have residual 'juice' still yet powering things like a stove, but nut not for very long. Cain had long known this to be a fact, because while the rest of the world could stand daylight on their skin, he could not. So he hid like a common rat. Like a common rat, he found some pretty interesting things, things that the rest of the world had long been ignorant of.
"Why don't you get some sleep while I prepare this heap to cook supper." Cain suggested without the slightest hitch nor deviation in his tone to even remotely give himself away.
"Ah, you know what I think I just might. Heavens forbid I do something stupid while I'm tired and who knows when I'll sleep again." The man commonly retorted. It was much to the contentedness of Cain who continued to essentially 'hotwire' a stove to the decaying power outlet. Moments would pass, and as the man fell into the safety of his dreams Cain was there waiting. Stalking like any predator would. The man thought that what he had to fear was on the OTHER side of the door, not this one. The soldier was rudely and abruptly awakened by a sudden 'crack'.
A gun had gone off. But where? He tried to sit up only to find, that he was now bound to a heavy piece of furniture. The more he struggle, the more he began to realize, was it suddenly hard to breathe? He looked down and on his chest; slowly expanding was a blood stain. He looked up at Cain with bewildered and questioning eyes. Cain sat quietly in the windowsill, the sidearm, HIS sidearm promptly in his hand dangling by his side. His head, turning this way and that following the disbelief and quizzical nature of the dying man tied up before him.
"Wha..? What the hell are you doing?" The soldier questioned Cain.
"I'm sitting in a windowsill, with a gun in my hand, smiling, because I'm about to eat." Cain replied stoically.
"About to eat? What the hell…-" He was cut off by the wheezing and coughing up blood that spilled from his lips in an oozing affair.
"If you were about to ask “What the hell did you shoot me for?" I'll give you a hint; I didn't shoot you because you looked prettier or because you were faster." Cain said simply, rising to his feet as he sauntered casually over to the man who was on his last but he was obviously fighting the effects of delirium. Cain settled to barrel of the gun against the man's forehead.
"That's...That's..." The man struggled panting with every breath.
"That's...what?" Cain questioned rhetorically. “I’m sorry, where were you again? You were expecting buffet lines and gourmet meals perhaps? The reality is this: The ends justify the means. That whatever one must do to survive, one must do. It's survival of the fittest. And you are not fit to live." Cain squeezed the trigger causing a sequence of events to unfold. The bullet to exit the chamber, burrow deep in the recesses of the man's brain and diverge out the back with a deluge of blood and smattering of brain matter. The man's head then slumped forwards.
An hour or so later, after the human carcass has been exhumed and quartered, the meat cooked thoroughly and without exception Cain devoured the flesh of a fellow man. His own hunger finally making him succumb to the grittiness of the meat, its tough texture--however good. Gorging himself on the fats that had cooked with the meat producing a succulent flavor uncannily resembling steak from a cow. Whilst feasting, a mutated rat--now the size of a squirrel-- burrowed its way through beneath one of the doors and scurried towards the burning flesh that was being cooked in a stew.
Having no taste for the more chewable hamstring muscles that had the consistency that corresponded to the chuck and rump cuts on a cow he tore the now roast beef-like portions of and threw them to the floor towards the rodent, who like his predecessors where skittish of upright walking ape-men like Cain. Within moments, a few more came in afterwards as Cain had his fill he let them gorge on the remains as he simply shoved the furniture out of the way and stepped outside the apartment room. He slid his gloves back on, having taken them off to quarter the body as finely as he could; he gripped his rifle, XM8 with renewed vigor and marched onwards to find the weapons that they were after having taken all he could from his former compatriot, leaving the scraps for anyone to pick up all except the head, that he brought with him...
"Madeline get your ass move'n dammit!, you'd swear this was something new. Fuck! we've been doing this long enough for you to know when to get up" a male voice growled.
Madeline felt heal of a boot press down on her hip bone, shoving her a little, not the most pleasant of wake up calls but better them some her father had given her before. "Dad, your not drill sergeant you don't have to scream at the top of you lungs. You want every creep in a hundred mile radios to know where the hell we are." she said as she turned and sat up on the old nap sack she had been sleeping on. Half the lining was falling out and it was covered in stains of blood dirt and God knows what else.
"Fuck the creeps I'll just put a God damn bullet between their eyes and the problem's solved Henry said as he proceeded to grab up equipment and erase their existence from the dirt around them.
Madeline sighed that was her fathers solution to everything, don't know who or what it is, put fucking bullet through it and see what happens. She had heard him say many times you can find out allot about someone character if you shoot at them. Now this concept to her was completely illogical but it made all kinds of sense in her father war wearied mind. She loved him with every fiber of her being but he had a few screws loose, Madeline proceeded to help pack things as well. She was still tired as hell, she had taken first watch the night before and still felt like she hadn't gotten any sleep. But it was hard to sleep when you had to worry about whether something would come up and kill you. Everyday they walked the fine line between life and death, and it was beginning to take it's toll on Madeline, her slumber attacked by nightmares of what she had witnessed since end of everything she had held dear.
But when she thought about it, it was going to happen eventually man had grown too powerful and forgot what was truly important. It was a never ending cycle that had been going on since God had brought man into existence.
Man is blessed with wealth and power for all the good he's done.
Man forgets where his blessings come from and becomes complacent.
Man gets stupid and fucks up.
God get pissed and reminds man who's in charge
Man humbles himself and strives to do good.
Man is blessed with wealth and power for all the good he's done....
Madeline was beginning to wondering if there was a God, it just seemed like the world was dragging along the same day after day. Maybe God had finally given up on man, and this... this was hell.
The sun was already pounding down on them and it was about 0700 hours. She soon had everything packed away, they would try to get several miles in before they would stop for breakfast so if she wanted to eat she had to get moving. Her father trudged ahead taking point, he always insisted that he do but frankly Madeline was the better shot.
"There's an old settlement just over those hills I want to get there before we stop for breakfast... then we can do some savaging" said Henry not even turning to talk to Madeline.
She had noticed the pause in his breathing, it was getting harder for him lately to go long distances before he needed to stop and take a break. Madeline could only imagine it was something she couldn't see, at fist glance Henry looked to be a strong, muscular man no one would ever guess him to be in his late 40's. It had to be something inside that wasn't working like it used to and she wasn't going to find out any time soon. Henry never talked about his problems and especially not with his daughter.
"Yes, sir" was all Madeline said there was no use in arguing or prodding him with questions about what was wrong cause he'd never tell her. She was just waiting for the day that she wakes up and he didn't. For a long time she had fought with that thought in her head, the first time she though she sounded so terrible, who would think such a thing about their father. Only a soulless, hateful person would ever say something like that about their father. But this was the real world people died every day, so what if it was her father she just prayed that when he did die she would be ready to take care of herself.
As the made it over the hills of rubble and debris she saw the bombed out ruins of what had once been a town or a city, either way there wasn't much left but they had made it. "Can we eat now?" she asked.
Jesus girl you'd swear you fucking never eat, come on lets find us a spot so you'll stop you bitching Henry growled.
Madeline felt heal of a boot press down on her hip bone, shoving her a little, not the most pleasant of wake up calls but better them some her father had given her before. "Dad, your not drill sergeant you don't have to scream at the top of you lungs. You want every creep in a hundred mile radios to know where the hell we are." she said as she turned and sat up on the old nap sack she had been sleeping on. Half the lining was falling out and it was covered in stains of blood dirt and God knows what else.
"Fuck the creeps I'll just put a God damn bullet between their eyes and the problem's solved Henry said as he proceeded to grab up equipment and erase their existence from the dirt around them.
Madeline sighed that was her fathers solution to everything, don't know who or what it is, put fucking bullet through it and see what happens. She had heard him say many times you can find out allot about someone character if you shoot at them. Now this concept to her was completely illogical but it made all kinds of sense in her father war wearied mind. She loved him with every fiber of her being but he had a few screws loose, Madeline proceeded to help pack things as well. She was still tired as hell, she had taken first watch the night before and still felt like she hadn't gotten any sleep. But it was hard to sleep when you had to worry about whether something would come up and kill you. Everyday they walked the fine line between life and death, and it was beginning to take it's toll on Madeline, her slumber attacked by nightmares of what she had witnessed since end of everything she had held dear.
But when she thought about it, it was going to happen eventually man had grown too powerful and forgot what was truly important. It was a never ending cycle that had been going on since God had brought man into existence.
Man is blessed with wealth and power for all the good he's done.
Man forgets where his blessings come from and becomes complacent.
Man gets stupid and fucks up.
God get pissed and reminds man who's in charge
Man humbles himself and strives to do good.
Man is blessed with wealth and power for all the good he's done....
Madeline was beginning to wondering if there was a God, it just seemed like the world was dragging along the same day after day. Maybe God had finally given up on man, and this... this was hell.
The sun was already pounding down on them and it was about 0700 hours. She soon had everything packed away, they would try to get several miles in before they would stop for breakfast so if she wanted to eat she had to get moving. Her father trudged ahead taking point, he always insisted that he do but frankly Madeline was the better shot.
"There's an old settlement just over those hills I want to get there before we stop for breakfast... then we can do some savaging" said Henry not even turning to talk to Madeline.
She had noticed the pause in his breathing, it was getting harder for him lately to go long distances before he needed to stop and take a break. Madeline could only imagine it was something she couldn't see, at fist glance Henry looked to be a strong, muscular man no one would ever guess him to be in his late 40's. It had to be something inside that wasn't working like it used to and she wasn't going to find out any time soon. Henry never talked about his problems and especially not with his daughter.
"Yes, sir" was all Madeline said there was no use in arguing or prodding him with questions about what was wrong cause he'd never tell her. She was just waiting for the day that she wakes up and he didn't. For a long time she had fought with that thought in her head, the first time she though she sounded so terrible, who would think such a thing about their father. Only a soulless, hateful person would ever say something like that about their father. But this was the real world people died every day, so what if it was her father she just prayed that when he did die she would be ready to take care of herself.
As the made it over the hills of rubble and debris she saw the bombed out ruins of what had once been a town or a city, either way there wasn't much left but they had made it. "Can we eat now?" she asked.
Jesus girl you'd swear you fucking never eat, come on lets find us a spot so you'll stop you bitching Henry growled.
Setting
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Cain sauntered through the soot filled remains of the city. Newspapers from ages ago blew around his feet, clinging to his armored legs as if a last ditch effort to foretell something that happened years ago. His shotgun strapped once again to his backside as he carried his XM8 with one slight difference to his appearance and that was the side arm that his dinner had so graciously given to him. He licked his lips at the thought of the succulent meat. But the side arm was more of a revolver, a weapons platform much of the world seemed to favor. Maybe he could sell it as he found no reason to find or buy ammunition for the unwieldy gun. It was unreasonably large. Was that man compensating for something when he bought a Magnum 500?
Cain thought back in the brevity of a moment. He seemed fairly decent in size to him. Letting the assault rifle slouch against his armor plated chest with the sling slung around his neck and shoulder and retrieved the hand gun. It's barrel length was 21.3 centimeters, it had a nickel plated finish, could only carry five rounds and the load it DID have was not the maximum bearing capacity. The casings were only of a .44 caliber--that while still could exact punishment--wasn't as hyper lethal as a slug that at its highest grain could strike with 2,500 foot pounds of force on whatever it hit. That was enough force to drive 60,000 pounds at the point of impact. That force would rapidly be distributed throughout the target's mass, sending shock waves out in a cone from the point of impact.
Overall meaning? He was shooting blanks pretty much.
While the gratification of figuring out just how MUCH damage the revolver could render, it was still costly. The recoil he imagined would be tremendous, throwing off the next target--given that he was perhaps engaging smaller organisms in bulk rather than bulky, outlandish creatures which he did his best to avoid--and the time it would take ANYONE to regain sights on the next opponent. Then, there of course was the extremely limited number of rounds. Even had he a speed loader--it was only five rounds. Shit would hit the fan faster than one could continuously reload the gun while maintaining fire. Not practical, not practical at all. He really wasn't made long for this life, was he?
After having holstered with a rig because he had no true holster-- Cain looked at the map. Most people in these wastelands didn't understand the concept of a map, let alone know really how to use one. Cain would never admit to not knowing fully how one was read. He simply always told the companies "Point it out her on the map, and I will go there." He never said to them, what coordinates were there--longitude or latitude--that would confuse people. Hell it would confuse Cain and Cain got a bit hot tempered when he felt stupid. Within a reasonable five mile degree of accuracy--he always did find his specified spot. How he did it was eidetic memory. From all the places he had been--and he had been to very many he could tell what kind of surroundings he would be in, where he would need to crawl, to rappel, to jump--to run in the case of some freakishly large mutant that needed a rocket launcher rather than 5.56 that probably felt more like bb's bouncing off its abhorrent calloused skin.
All things considered, he stood now near a massive sinkhole in the city's epicenter where a bomb--a rather large bomb--had been dropped in years past. With eyes trained to stalk prey, he could see where the initial weight of the bomb simply dove through the asphalt and nestled down somewhere in the sub levels before finally detonating. The people at the city's core would have probably been evaporated like water to a hot sun. The way the buildings facing the chasm were bent inwards as though God has put his hands on their facades--all of them-- and pushed back on them. The street, what was left other than a gaping black hole, was risen like splintered wood with bits of tar scraped roadways pointing towards the heavens and the areas around the circumference were bulged like a 'blister' unto the skin.
He packed the map away nonchalantly, and from one of his many pouches, he drew a flare rod. It would burn with a red tinge. He had learned to make them from a book that he had read amongst the rabble of another lost paradise. Because of his highly functioning memory process, he burned the book itself. Yet every word was stuck, lingering in the recesses of his mind. It would be among his many secrets.
His flares, however, were simple to put together. The complexity came from searching for the materials. His flares used a mixture of potassium nitrate, potassium nitrate being one of several nitrogen-containing compounds collectively referred to as saltpeter, and sawdust, aluminum or magnesium as a fuel. For a pyrotechnic charge to get the colored glow, he used strontium carbonate. This slowed the burning of the compositions, decomposed yielding carbon dioxide. It was fire retardant in gunpowders. It didn't readily absorb moisture, it neutralized acids. It was superior over strontium oxalate in absence of magnesium. And when he wanted or needed underwater illumination, he used a chemical that had once been used in incendiary bombs as well as rodentcide called Photophor or Polytanol--calcium phosphide. A highly reactive substance, on contact with acids or water, calcium phosphide released phosphine, which ignited spontaneously.
The reason he had decided this was the location, was because the vault he needed to breach was in an inaccessible area. It was beyond this 'hole' in the ground but there was a subway system that seemed to be at least partly unscathed by the destruction, or cleared after the blast excavated the tonnage of earth around it center. He would then venture from there. But he had to see how far down it was.
He struck one of his hand made flares, standing at the edge of the crater where--in a simple few moments-- the lives of many were lost. But all that didn't matter to him. They were dead, he was alive and he had a job to do. Releasing his grip on the 'candlestick' he watched through his black visor the light drift and drift and drift--seemingly forever falling before it hit rock bottom. Most would not have seen as far as he did, in fact, he guaranteed humans could not see that far down in that much darkness. But there were surprising elements to Cain that people knew nothing of.
They could speculate, they could piss him off--sure, he enjoyed taking his time with those that would pry and agitate that psychotic nerve. In fact, he quietly wanted it. The undue attention. A reason to harness that indecency that was apart of him aching to get out. Begging...pleading...
His carmine colored eyes watched with stilled focus as something in the subterranean scurried around the light. Mutants. His illegitimate siblings. Though, those affected by irradiated gasses the worst, had no minds of their own. They were no more coherent than walking pustules of dead carcasses lurching about. The only difference is that they had a heart beat. To Cain, that wasn't a difference. Just another reason to end their miserable existences with extreme prejudice. Not because they wanted to die, or he had some unspoken and reserved sympathy for them--he didn't. He simply admired the fact that they could die. Granted, they were a lot tougher to kill than a human or a zombie. They had redundant systems, double organs, limbs and the likes--that's only if they were human. Any manner of creature from a worm to an elephant can have mutated into some grotesque abomination.
"Around...two thousand and a couple hundred feet give or take...Looks like I'm diving." Cain rhetorically said aloud as he stared down the chasm. Immediately he began to unravel strong cord and finding just the right thing to tie it to. He meticulously positioned himself in such a way that he could see, from his perspective the best possible approach to descend from. Eventually, he would come to hook a non-locking carabiner onto a fallen pillar of stone with an exposed re-bar system integrated. He then placed a system of his own devising to trigger and manipulate the failure of the carbiner. Something to collapse it so that he could retract it and use the length of highly elastic rope he had scrounged up from left over parachutes.
Using some of this material, he had created 'webbing'. With one lateral strap going across two longer vertical straps. He first tied two leg hoops five inches apart with simple over-hand knots. Slipping the loops around and bring them up his thighs to hid groin , using the lateral strap like a seat belt that went across his waist. He then, took ether end of the untied portions of cord that lay strewn downwards and then tucked and looped either end in a criss-cross manner with one untied end looping through the opposite 'joints' now tied around his thighs. He then tied the remainder around his midsection tying a loose overhand knot in the end of a strap. Threaded the other strap in the reverse direction following the exact path of the first overhand knot and pulled the knot tight. He then took a locking carabiner through the leg loop and up through the waist band creating his tie-in point.
He then took what was known as a figure-eight which had a large hole at the base, with outward protrusions to prevent rope lock-up. He Bent the wire he was going to be actually using to descend into the maw of this cavern, twice so he he had double hoops. He pushed it through the large hole and wrapped it around and anchored it on the 'hooks'. He then locked his carabiner into the smaller hole of the figure-eight. Once he felt comfortable he began walking backwards off the edge of the ruinous gaping wound. As he pulled himself downwards into what most would have considered the mouth of hell, he kept his feet perpendicular with the edifice of the of the sheer vertical rock face.
The further he went down, the more radiation he could feel barraging him even through the heavy ass equipment relaxed and weighing him down. He felt at home here. More so than in a dusty town. Perhaps it was the subtle things...the fact that, with every potential enemy he could feel their heart thudding in their chests, a sensation that he perpetually sought to silence. That he could be himself here. A hunter. A killer. Everything had a place here. Even light had its place. Looking up, he saw the mouth of the crater swallow him just like that--a mouth. The jaws of a voracious beast.
As he hit the farthest ledge down that he could get to on the amount of cable he had he drew himself to the wall. It was covered in a mucous concoction similar to spider webbing. There was something...fun down here. The thought of him being exterminated brought a giddiness similar to an orgasm to his nerves. He persisted, but only after he had activated the small detonation to free the other end of his cable. He watched it spring loose and with a tug, fall.
It fell, and fell. It seemed to take forever but in reality was only a few moments before he watched it fall and fall some more right on past him and into the labyrinth below. When it stopped falling he pulled it in slowly; winding the strong flexible cable around one arm until he hooked it around and underneath the man rows of coiled tensile freeing his hands. He took up his XM8 that had been resting lazily on his chest.
It was time to work.
His carmine eyes surveyed the rotunda shaped devastation, The tracks were still a ways away. However, the crumbling ruins inside this cesspool were ripe for opportunity. Dare devil tactics that one would have to face the facts: Falling and breaking a leg was the least of their worries here. He could hear something moving in the darkness around him. Before him was a spiraling walk way. It looked appalling enough. One wrong step be it from to much weight or meandering of course and there was a very, very large plunge awaiting him to the bottom.
His senses told him, he was being stalked. The hairs on the back of his human flesh began to raise as if to grasp at even the slightest movement or whisper. He gripped his rifle in one hand, and with the other he lit another flare but rather than carry it--for which it would be too much for his eyes to sustain visual-- he threw it outwards revealing a hive of bat-winged creatures. They had the complexion--the consistency and color of human flesh, indeed they even had the arms but they were hybridized creations. Their arms were elongated, having only one true 'finger' left on their ends while the rest fanned out conveying to most the horrors of mutations of wings.
They had human skulls, but their skulls had evolved without eyes so they held no real facial expression. They, like Cain had two rows of razor sharp teeth. They could very much fly, and cling to the surfaces of walls--several of which had begun to hang upside down. All this intrigued Cain. Who simply looked on in an objective standing. Though upon seeing the bright light, they began to create horrid screeching noises as if in pain. Was it the heat? Suddenly, he spotted two out of the corner of his eyes crawling towards him. They must have picked up the difference in his scent compared to their feces.
Gripping his assault rifle in preparedness, he really didn't want to use it. Not because he felt bad for them in any manner--they were vermin to him. Something easily plucked and squashed. But if they reacted to the flare with such disdain, the ensuing firefight would bring a swarm like pissed off bee hive. He turned away, he ran along the spiral layout, drawing himself deeper into the belly of the beast. The light from the flare that was now far enough away to react with his different eyes--eyes that reacted more like a felines in that they could absorb a small amount of light and see substantially much better than a human's ever dreamed of in the pitch blackness of this tomb. He used it well.
Jumping across ledges, using all his muscular power to lift his heavily armored body. His heart began to throb. It was excited. It didn't know rather or not he would even live through this. It was always in a constant flux with his mental capacity to keep collected under duress. It was this feeling that set him free. He enjoyed being a predator but he also enjoyed learning about his prey. How they reacted, how moved, how they breathed or called for help. It was these mechanics that made him all the more a lethal killer.
Cain ran and leaped out towards the center of the depository, falling the remaining twenty or so feet down landing with 'thud' that sounded like a jackhammer strike. It was due to the immensity of the armor he bore, and wore around on a day-to-day basis. It was extremely heavy, most could even pick it up let alone wear it everyday like a t-shirt. Two-hundred pounds alone. That was not with all the added equipment attached to it, the guns, the ammunition and the supplies. This was a strong point for the people in "towns" to contest that the "Albino" was in-fact a mutant living among them. This brought most disgust, but also a fear. But unlike the simple fear from a man with a gun--Cain provided an added threat. They didn't know what he could do, let alone prove without a doubt he was. But he never yet denied the allegations.
In fact, he was indeed a hybrid. But the mutations were constantly growing. The reason for his extraordinary strength, comparable to a silverback gorilla--enabling him to easily break, squeeze, tear off and move incredibly heavy objects. The cause of this mutation? The hyper condensed muscles in his arms and legs. Nearly four times as hard as a humans would be of a comparable growth. This meant that while he certainly didn't look any bigger or stronger--he was actually both. This highly dense bundle of musculature that has attached to an equally impressive hardened skeletal frame allowed him to be six times the strength of any normal, every day man.
This was a frightening concept to be sure. An entirely overpowering humanoid that could not only shoot a gun--but could literally crush a man's skull terrified the locales. The fact that he could see in the dark--although they were never truly aware of just how well-- it nevertheless, unnerved them to see his feats in complete darkness. Simply his acuity with the senses themselves; on several occasions mobs had tried to essentially ambush Caine, only to find that his animal-like tendencies and natural gifts made him very astute. He could smell them even though they didn't have a particularly pungent aroma--none that a normal human could smell. He also has surround sound hearing, meaning he can flex the small bones in his ears to accurately tune in to hear even a heart beating.
Even his mouth could relay things like temperature differences, sensing from both sides of the head and following trails based on chemical cues is called tropotaxis. His teeth's dentin and enamel had super hardened and even though they looked like a humans teeth s till, there were serrated ridges, like small steak knives even on his molars. This made flesh a prime target over anything else. Human. Animal. Mutant. Flesh was flesh to him. His jaw was unlike a humans as well. It was designed more like a Rottweilers, in the function that it could essentially "lock" into place. But this had a devastating effect to whatever he had a hold of in his mouth. Snapping his jaws shut, he had a bite force enough to snap the femur of a human leg.
He did have several drawbacks. One being a true albino, he could not endure the sunlight on his bare skin, it was why when he was younger he dwelt within the slums of shanty towns in the badlands lived inside the ruins like this city like a ghost. It provided much needed shelter from the sun's UV rays. While not nearly as potent as it formally was due to the nuclear winter from the fallout of the war--to him as an Albino, it was very similar to turning an arc welder loose on human flesh. The effects can speak for themselves. Large, painful blisters that can quickly go from some the size of a dime, to covering his whole backside in several cases that left disfiguring scars.
Another was his mutation itself. While being highly adaptive its progressive effects could be decisively seen all over his body. In the scars that littered it. He would begin to mutate secondary limbs or some other extra appendage and he simply, cut it off. Though make no mistake, he bled heavily, and the pain was excruciating. It was a source of severe contempt and disdain for Cain. Moreover, if he allowed it to progress past the initial stages of growth there was no telling what the effects would be. For Cain, it would feel like he would be lost in a conglomeration of grotesque, abhorrent mutations.
This one had alerted the guardians of the nest. These weren't winged creatures, but tall--perhaps seven or eight feet in height. They had two extra limbs, like arms but the didn't have hands on them. No, instead, these limbs ended in long, thick spikes that could perforate steel. Real welcoming guys they were. They were incredibly strong, even stronger than Cain was himself. They could scale walls very quickly using their double-jointed arms and defensive weaponry. Their talon-tipped feet, being heavily contaminated with fecal matter could cause severe sepsis.
But they did something that annoyed Cain. It was sort of a pet peeve. They spat. Their spitting irked him. However, it served a mechanical function. Anything that they digested, came up as a mucous web based mater that was sticky and viscous. It sickened him. He would kill them when he came across them, if for nothing else but because of what they did got under his skin. He stared out seemingly into a void, but he could see them crawling on all fours like beasts of burdening.
He waited for them to come. The residual shock-wave vibrating their 'webbing', the thick coat of mucous that encapsulated this dismal hole in the ground. He took off his XM8, un-slinging it from around his neck and shoulder. It would draw too much attention. He set it down slowly, in the the muck and grime. He would clean it later. Several times. But for now, for the task he had at hand he unsnapped his shotgun and withdrew it. His fingers, in an almost rehearsed manner indexed several--questionable shotgun rounds and cycled them into the slide while remaining on point with the stock pressed firmly against one shoulder.
The rounds he was loading into the barrel so effortlessly, were fléchettes. These dart-shaped tungsten carbide projectiles were thirty in number--per shotgun shell. While it had a charge to propel the projectiles forwards with extreme, the resulting firing would only create a very loud 'crack' and not result with a muzzle flash. The fléchettes themselves were denser than steel. They could punch through soft body armor with ease. They were banned in the past for being "inhumane". He stalked forwards, gripping the forearm of the shotgun while pinning the stock tightly against his shoulder.
Cain moved forwards, walking towards these terrors with a calm dispassion, his eyes looking straight ahead. The blood was pumping heavily through out his body. He was excited. He was exhilarated. He drew the forearm to, cocking the first round into the chamber. Inside of his chest, beneath layers of armored plating, beyond the taut muscle that clothed his skeletal frame--beat the heart of a true killer. A fearless machine with nerves of ice, and determination that was predictably stubborn.
The first in a grouping of three stood upright and threw its arms back, releasing a extraordinarily high-pitched scream that resonated through the chamber. Cain instantly lifted the 12 gauge rifle to point at the broadness of its chest. A perfect target. He squeezed the trigger. A loud 'pop' resounded but hardly any muzzle flash. In that instant, thirty tungsten carbide darts exploded from the barrel. The punctured, not only the monster in front of him, but the spread caught the second in the eye-less facade skull. The dart mangled the connective tissues of its brain. Bouncing around as a frangible like a pin ball, dropping it immediately, and the third in the leg. The chest shot to the first didn't kill it, but did substantial flesh and muscle tissue damage.
The creature lurched forwards with one of its defensive arms striking out, while it leaned forwards exerting pressure. Cain avoided the sharpened claw, side stepping and pivoting around, ducking under the extended arm cocking the rifle again dispelling the cartridge from the guns port and loading the next chambered round. But rather than expend another round of the frangible munition, he slung the rifle behind him and unlatched his tomahawk. The curved and deadly tempered steel bladed was honed. Gripping the axe handle he rushed the creature's face which snapped its jaws at him.
Saliva dripped from its open mouth as it bit at him trying to recover the limb it had embedded in the ground in its haste to quickly kill him. Using the backwards curving hook atop the axe head, pierced the fleshy underside of its jaw in between the bones and before the throat. It whined, and thrashed as it suddenly recognized the severity of the pain. Pressing a boot to the creature's chest, he had gotten an alarming amount of leverage. Gripping the single handed axe with both hands, he twisted and pulled the creature's jaw away from its own structurally sound mechanics. The flesh tore in a gruesome, barbaric display of which Cain was grinning psychotically as he felt the creatures blood flowing and with it--its heart beat.
The lower palette tore away from the remainder of the creature's countenance. The bones began to splinter and break apart. He could feel it in his hands. The power raging trough him. He was addicted to it. It was the truest drug, the only one he'd ever need. He tore the jaw off the axe although it barely needed any further tearing from the amount of devastation he had already caused. He roared himself, though not nearly as loud, it held its own sinister tone and was definitely not human. The blood had gotten to him, he felt himself slipping in a frenzy. That mind numbing belligerence. The sheer acts of violence that came afterwards when he gave into his indecent nature.
He mounted the hemorrhaging creature. If they experienced shock the way that humans had, it was definitely in it by now. But it wasn't enough for Cain. Something in him had broken loose. A primal aspect. A terrible aspect. Before he killed because it was needed. Now, now he killed because he simply wanted to. Again he lifted the axe and brought it down on the creature's skull. The bones splintered yet again, and yet again the flesh was sundered. He drove the axe into the creature's cranium, going deeper and deeper with his psychotic fit of rage until he was covered in blood, brains and shit.
The third was limping away when Cain took notice of the movement. He twisted and craned his head stepping down the carcass of the first guardian that had been literally minced. The axe in his hand still having gorged bits and chunks of flesh and pulp on it. It was dragging itself because the frangible had torn one of its tendons in its leg. He gripped the axe loosely as he stalked towards the beast and feasted on the confusion in its eyes. It was not human, it didn't comprehend what was going on. Its brain, panicked and it was in flight mode.However it was still dangerous. Nevertheless, Cain mocked it.
"Come on beasty, get to your fucking feet!" He called out to it, waving it towards himself with both hands. He was seething and drooling. Gore and violence had this effect on him.If something was ultra violent, it tapped into his hybrid genetics and brought fully to the surface. It made the world see who was and what he was very capable of doing. It was a side he had to keep under wraps at all times while in a settlement lest he massacre the town. He had done it a time or two when he was younger. Two of the border towns in other sectors seemingly...vanished. When really, he had taken every man, woman, and child and slaughtered them.
Everyone had their coping skills...
Cain thought back in the brevity of a moment. He seemed fairly decent in size to him. Letting the assault rifle slouch against his armor plated chest with the sling slung around his neck and shoulder and retrieved the hand gun. It's barrel length was 21.3 centimeters, it had a nickel plated finish, could only carry five rounds and the load it DID have was not the maximum bearing capacity. The casings were only of a .44 caliber--that while still could exact punishment--wasn't as hyper lethal as a slug that at its highest grain could strike with 2,500 foot pounds of force on whatever it hit. That was enough force to drive 60,000 pounds at the point of impact. That force would rapidly be distributed throughout the target's mass, sending shock waves out in a cone from the point of impact.
Overall meaning? He was shooting blanks pretty much.
While the gratification of figuring out just how MUCH damage the revolver could render, it was still costly. The recoil he imagined would be tremendous, throwing off the next target--given that he was perhaps engaging smaller organisms in bulk rather than bulky, outlandish creatures which he did his best to avoid--and the time it would take ANYONE to regain sights on the next opponent. Then, there of course was the extremely limited number of rounds. Even had he a speed loader--it was only five rounds. Shit would hit the fan faster than one could continuously reload the gun while maintaining fire. Not practical, not practical at all. He really wasn't made long for this life, was he?
After having holstered with a rig because he had no true holster-- Cain looked at the map. Most people in these wastelands didn't understand the concept of a map, let alone know really how to use one. Cain would never admit to not knowing fully how one was read. He simply always told the companies "Point it out her on the map, and I will go there." He never said to them, what coordinates were there--longitude or latitude--that would confuse people. Hell it would confuse Cain and Cain got a bit hot tempered when he felt stupid. Within a reasonable five mile degree of accuracy--he always did find his specified spot. How he did it was eidetic memory. From all the places he had been--and he had been to very many he could tell what kind of surroundings he would be in, where he would need to crawl, to rappel, to jump--to run in the case of some freakishly large mutant that needed a rocket launcher rather than 5.56 that probably felt more like bb's bouncing off its abhorrent calloused skin.
All things considered, he stood now near a massive sinkhole in the city's epicenter where a bomb--a rather large bomb--had been dropped in years past. With eyes trained to stalk prey, he could see where the initial weight of the bomb simply dove through the asphalt and nestled down somewhere in the sub levels before finally detonating. The people at the city's core would have probably been evaporated like water to a hot sun. The way the buildings facing the chasm were bent inwards as though God has put his hands on their facades--all of them-- and pushed back on them. The street, what was left other than a gaping black hole, was risen like splintered wood with bits of tar scraped roadways pointing towards the heavens and the areas around the circumference were bulged like a 'blister' unto the skin.
He packed the map away nonchalantly, and from one of his many pouches, he drew a flare rod. It would burn with a red tinge. He had learned to make them from a book that he had read amongst the rabble of another lost paradise. Because of his highly functioning memory process, he burned the book itself. Yet every word was stuck, lingering in the recesses of his mind. It would be among his many secrets.
His flares, however, were simple to put together. The complexity came from searching for the materials. His flares used a mixture of potassium nitrate, potassium nitrate being one of several nitrogen-containing compounds collectively referred to as saltpeter, and sawdust, aluminum or magnesium as a fuel. For a pyrotechnic charge to get the colored glow, he used strontium carbonate. This slowed the burning of the compositions, decomposed yielding carbon dioxide. It was fire retardant in gunpowders. It didn't readily absorb moisture, it neutralized acids. It was superior over strontium oxalate in absence of magnesium. And when he wanted or needed underwater illumination, he used a chemical that had once been used in incendiary bombs as well as rodentcide called Photophor or Polytanol--calcium phosphide. A highly reactive substance, on contact with acids or water, calcium phosphide released phosphine, which ignited spontaneously.
The reason he had decided this was the location, was because the vault he needed to breach was in an inaccessible area. It was beyond this 'hole' in the ground but there was a subway system that seemed to be at least partly unscathed by the destruction, or cleared after the blast excavated the tonnage of earth around it center. He would then venture from there. But he had to see how far down it was.
He struck one of his hand made flares, standing at the edge of the crater where--in a simple few moments-- the lives of many were lost. But all that didn't matter to him. They were dead, he was alive and he had a job to do. Releasing his grip on the 'candlestick' he watched through his black visor the light drift and drift and drift--seemingly forever falling before it hit rock bottom. Most would not have seen as far as he did, in fact, he guaranteed humans could not see that far down in that much darkness. But there were surprising elements to Cain that people knew nothing of.
They could speculate, they could piss him off--sure, he enjoyed taking his time with those that would pry and agitate that psychotic nerve. In fact, he quietly wanted it. The undue attention. A reason to harness that indecency that was apart of him aching to get out. Begging...pleading...
His carmine colored eyes watched with stilled focus as something in the subterranean scurried around the light. Mutants. His illegitimate siblings. Though, those affected by irradiated gasses the worst, had no minds of their own. They were no more coherent than walking pustules of dead carcasses lurching about. The only difference is that they had a heart beat. To Cain, that wasn't a difference. Just another reason to end their miserable existences with extreme prejudice. Not because they wanted to die, or he had some unspoken and reserved sympathy for them--he didn't. He simply admired the fact that they could die. Granted, they were a lot tougher to kill than a human or a zombie. They had redundant systems, double organs, limbs and the likes--that's only if they were human. Any manner of creature from a worm to an elephant can have mutated into some grotesque abomination.
"Around...two thousand and a couple hundred feet give or take...Looks like I'm diving." Cain rhetorically said aloud as he stared down the chasm. Immediately he began to unravel strong cord and finding just the right thing to tie it to. He meticulously positioned himself in such a way that he could see, from his perspective the best possible approach to descend from. Eventually, he would come to hook a non-locking carabiner onto a fallen pillar of stone with an exposed re-bar system integrated. He then placed a system of his own devising to trigger and manipulate the failure of the carbiner. Something to collapse it so that he could retract it and use the length of highly elastic rope he had scrounged up from left over parachutes.
Using some of this material, he had created 'webbing'. With one lateral strap going across two longer vertical straps. He first tied two leg hoops five inches apart with simple over-hand knots. Slipping the loops around and bring them up his thighs to hid groin , using the lateral strap like a seat belt that went across his waist. He then, took ether end of the untied portions of cord that lay strewn downwards and then tucked and looped either end in a criss-cross manner with one untied end looping through the opposite 'joints' now tied around his thighs. He then tied the remainder around his midsection tying a loose overhand knot in the end of a strap. Threaded the other strap in the reverse direction following the exact path of the first overhand knot and pulled the knot tight. He then took a locking carabiner through the leg loop and up through the waist band creating his tie-in point.
He then took what was known as a figure-eight which had a large hole at the base, with outward protrusions to prevent rope lock-up. He Bent the wire he was going to be actually using to descend into the maw of this cavern, twice so he he had double hoops. He pushed it through the large hole and wrapped it around and anchored it on the 'hooks'. He then locked his carabiner into the smaller hole of the figure-eight. Once he felt comfortable he began walking backwards off the edge of the ruinous gaping wound. As he pulled himself downwards into what most would have considered the mouth of hell, he kept his feet perpendicular with the edifice of the of the sheer vertical rock face.
The further he went down, the more radiation he could feel barraging him even through the heavy ass equipment relaxed and weighing him down. He felt at home here. More so than in a dusty town. Perhaps it was the subtle things...the fact that, with every potential enemy he could feel their heart thudding in their chests, a sensation that he perpetually sought to silence. That he could be himself here. A hunter. A killer. Everything had a place here. Even light had its place. Looking up, he saw the mouth of the crater swallow him just like that--a mouth. The jaws of a voracious beast.
As he hit the farthest ledge down that he could get to on the amount of cable he had he drew himself to the wall. It was covered in a mucous concoction similar to spider webbing. There was something...fun down here. The thought of him being exterminated brought a giddiness similar to an orgasm to his nerves. He persisted, but only after he had activated the small detonation to free the other end of his cable. He watched it spring loose and with a tug, fall.
It fell, and fell. It seemed to take forever but in reality was only a few moments before he watched it fall and fall some more right on past him and into the labyrinth below. When it stopped falling he pulled it in slowly; winding the strong flexible cable around one arm until he hooked it around and underneath the man rows of coiled tensile freeing his hands. He took up his XM8 that had been resting lazily on his chest.
It was time to work.
His carmine eyes surveyed the rotunda shaped devastation, The tracks were still a ways away. However, the crumbling ruins inside this cesspool were ripe for opportunity. Dare devil tactics that one would have to face the facts: Falling and breaking a leg was the least of their worries here. He could hear something moving in the darkness around him. Before him was a spiraling walk way. It looked appalling enough. One wrong step be it from to much weight or meandering of course and there was a very, very large plunge awaiting him to the bottom.
His senses told him, he was being stalked. The hairs on the back of his human flesh began to raise as if to grasp at even the slightest movement or whisper. He gripped his rifle in one hand, and with the other he lit another flare but rather than carry it--for which it would be too much for his eyes to sustain visual-- he threw it outwards revealing a hive of bat-winged creatures. They had the complexion--the consistency and color of human flesh, indeed they even had the arms but they were hybridized creations. Their arms were elongated, having only one true 'finger' left on their ends while the rest fanned out conveying to most the horrors of mutations of wings.
They had human skulls, but their skulls had evolved without eyes so they held no real facial expression. They, like Cain had two rows of razor sharp teeth. They could very much fly, and cling to the surfaces of walls--several of which had begun to hang upside down. All this intrigued Cain. Who simply looked on in an objective standing. Though upon seeing the bright light, they began to create horrid screeching noises as if in pain. Was it the heat? Suddenly, he spotted two out of the corner of his eyes crawling towards him. They must have picked up the difference in his scent compared to their feces.
Gripping his assault rifle in preparedness, he really didn't want to use it. Not because he felt bad for them in any manner--they were vermin to him. Something easily plucked and squashed. But if they reacted to the flare with such disdain, the ensuing firefight would bring a swarm like pissed off bee hive. He turned away, he ran along the spiral layout, drawing himself deeper into the belly of the beast. The light from the flare that was now far enough away to react with his different eyes--eyes that reacted more like a felines in that they could absorb a small amount of light and see substantially much better than a human's ever dreamed of in the pitch blackness of this tomb. He used it well.
Jumping across ledges, using all his muscular power to lift his heavily armored body. His heart began to throb. It was excited. It didn't know rather or not he would even live through this. It was always in a constant flux with his mental capacity to keep collected under duress. It was this feeling that set him free. He enjoyed being a predator but he also enjoyed learning about his prey. How they reacted, how moved, how they breathed or called for help. It was these mechanics that made him all the more a lethal killer.
Cain ran and leaped out towards the center of the depository, falling the remaining twenty or so feet down landing with 'thud' that sounded like a jackhammer strike. It was due to the immensity of the armor he bore, and wore around on a day-to-day basis. It was extremely heavy, most could even pick it up let alone wear it everyday like a t-shirt. Two-hundred pounds alone. That was not with all the added equipment attached to it, the guns, the ammunition and the supplies. This was a strong point for the people in "towns" to contest that the "Albino" was in-fact a mutant living among them. This brought most disgust, but also a fear. But unlike the simple fear from a man with a gun--Cain provided an added threat. They didn't know what he could do, let alone prove without a doubt he was. But he never yet denied the allegations.
In fact, he was indeed a hybrid. But the mutations were constantly growing. The reason for his extraordinary strength, comparable to a silverback gorilla--enabling him to easily break, squeeze, tear off and move incredibly heavy objects. The cause of this mutation? The hyper condensed muscles in his arms and legs. Nearly four times as hard as a humans would be of a comparable growth. This meant that while he certainly didn't look any bigger or stronger--he was actually both. This highly dense bundle of musculature that has attached to an equally impressive hardened skeletal frame allowed him to be six times the strength of any normal, every day man.
This was a frightening concept to be sure. An entirely overpowering humanoid that could not only shoot a gun--but could literally crush a man's skull terrified the locales. The fact that he could see in the dark--although they were never truly aware of just how well-- it nevertheless, unnerved them to see his feats in complete darkness. Simply his acuity with the senses themselves; on several occasions mobs had tried to essentially ambush Caine, only to find that his animal-like tendencies and natural gifts made him very astute. He could smell them even though they didn't have a particularly pungent aroma--none that a normal human could smell. He also has surround sound hearing, meaning he can flex the small bones in his ears to accurately tune in to hear even a heart beating.
Even his mouth could relay things like temperature differences, sensing from both sides of the head and following trails based on chemical cues is called tropotaxis. His teeth's dentin and enamel had super hardened and even though they looked like a humans teeth s till, there were serrated ridges, like small steak knives even on his molars. This made flesh a prime target over anything else. Human. Animal. Mutant. Flesh was flesh to him. His jaw was unlike a humans as well. It was designed more like a Rottweilers, in the function that it could essentially "lock" into place. But this had a devastating effect to whatever he had a hold of in his mouth. Snapping his jaws shut, he had a bite force enough to snap the femur of a human leg.
He did have several drawbacks. One being a true albino, he could not endure the sunlight on his bare skin, it was why when he was younger he dwelt within the slums of shanty towns in the badlands lived inside the ruins like this city like a ghost. It provided much needed shelter from the sun's UV rays. While not nearly as potent as it formally was due to the nuclear winter from the fallout of the war--to him as an Albino, it was very similar to turning an arc welder loose on human flesh. The effects can speak for themselves. Large, painful blisters that can quickly go from some the size of a dime, to covering his whole backside in several cases that left disfiguring scars.
Another was his mutation itself. While being highly adaptive its progressive effects could be decisively seen all over his body. In the scars that littered it. He would begin to mutate secondary limbs or some other extra appendage and he simply, cut it off. Though make no mistake, he bled heavily, and the pain was excruciating. It was a source of severe contempt and disdain for Cain. Moreover, if he allowed it to progress past the initial stages of growth there was no telling what the effects would be. For Cain, it would feel like he would be lost in a conglomeration of grotesque, abhorrent mutations.
This one had alerted the guardians of the nest. These weren't winged creatures, but tall--perhaps seven or eight feet in height. They had two extra limbs, like arms but the didn't have hands on them. No, instead, these limbs ended in long, thick spikes that could perforate steel. Real welcoming guys they were. They were incredibly strong, even stronger than Cain was himself. They could scale walls very quickly using their double-jointed arms and defensive weaponry. Their talon-tipped feet, being heavily contaminated with fecal matter could cause severe sepsis.
But they did something that annoyed Cain. It was sort of a pet peeve. They spat. Their spitting irked him. However, it served a mechanical function. Anything that they digested, came up as a mucous web based mater that was sticky and viscous. It sickened him. He would kill them when he came across them, if for nothing else but because of what they did got under his skin. He stared out seemingly into a void, but he could see them crawling on all fours like beasts of burdening.
He waited for them to come. The residual shock-wave vibrating their 'webbing', the thick coat of mucous that encapsulated this dismal hole in the ground. He took off his XM8, un-slinging it from around his neck and shoulder. It would draw too much attention. He set it down slowly, in the the muck and grime. He would clean it later. Several times. But for now, for the task he had at hand he unsnapped his shotgun and withdrew it. His fingers, in an almost rehearsed manner indexed several--questionable shotgun rounds and cycled them into the slide while remaining on point with the stock pressed firmly against one shoulder.
The rounds he was loading into the barrel so effortlessly, were fléchettes. These dart-shaped tungsten carbide projectiles were thirty in number--per shotgun shell. While it had a charge to propel the projectiles forwards with extreme, the resulting firing would only create a very loud 'crack' and not result with a muzzle flash. The fléchettes themselves were denser than steel. They could punch through soft body armor with ease. They were banned in the past for being "inhumane". He stalked forwards, gripping the forearm of the shotgun while pinning the stock tightly against his shoulder.
Cain moved forwards, walking towards these terrors with a calm dispassion, his eyes looking straight ahead. The blood was pumping heavily through out his body. He was excited. He was exhilarated. He drew the forearm to, cocking the first round into the chamber. Inside of his chest, beneath layers of armored plating, beyond the taut muscle that clothed his skeletal frame--beat the heart of a true killer. A fearless machine with nerves of ice, and determination that was predictably stubborn.
The first in a grouping of three stood upright and threw its arms back, releasing a extraordinarily high-pitched scream that resonated through the chamber. Cain instantly lifted the 12 gauge rifle to point at the broadness of its chest. A perfect target. He squeezed the trigger. A loud 'pop' resounded but hardly any muzzle flash. In that instant, thirty tungsten carbide darts exploded from the barrel. The punctured, not only the monster in front of him, but the spread caught the second in the eye-less facade skull. The dart mangled the connective tissues of its brain. Bouncing around as a frangible like a pin ball, dropping it immediately, and the third in the leg. The chest shot to the first didn't kill it, but did substantial flesh and muscle tissue damage.
The creature lurched forwards with one of its defensive arms striking out, while it leaned forwards exerting pressure. Cain avoided the sharpened claw, side stepping and pivoting around, ducking under the extended arm cocking the rifle again dispelling the cartridge from the guns port and loading the next chambered round. But rather than expend another round of the frangible munition, he slung the rifle behind him and unlatched his tomahawk. The curved and deadly tempered steel bladed was honed. Gripping the axe handle he rushed the creature's face which snapped its jaws at him.
Saliva dripped from its open mouth as it bit at him trying to recover the limb it had embedded in the ground in its haste to quickly kill him. Using the backwards curving hook atop the axe head, pierced the fleshy underside of its jaw in between the bones and before the throat. It whined, and thrashed as it suddenly recognized the severity of the pain. Pressing a boot to the creature's chest, he had gotten an alarming amount of leverage. Gripping the single handed axe with both hands, he twisted and pulled the creature's jaw away from its own structurally sound mechanics. The flesh tore in a gruesome, barbaric display of which Cain was grinning psychotically as he felt the creatures blood flowing and with it--its heart beat.
The lower palette tore away from the remainder of the creature's countenance. The bones began to splinter and break apart. He could feel it in his hands. The power raging trough him. He was addicted to it. It was the truest drug, the only one he'd ever need. He tore the jaw off the axe although it barely needed any further tearing from the amount of devastation he had already caused. He roared himself, though not nearly as loud, it held its own sinister tone and was definitely not human. The blood had gotten to him, he felt himself slipping in a frenzy. That mind numbing belligerence. The sheer acts of violence that came afterwards when he gave into his indecent nature.
He mounted the hemorrhaging creature. If they experienced shock the way that humans had, it was definitely in it by now. But it wasn't enough for Cain. Something in him had broken loose. A primal aspect. A terrible aspect. Before he killed because it was needed. Now, now he killed because he simply wanted to. Again he lifted the axe and brought it down on the creature's skull. The bones splintered yet again, and yet again the flesh was sundered. He drove the axe into the creature's cranium, going deeper and deeper with his psychotic fit of rage until he was covered in blood, brains and shit.
The third was limping away when Cain took notice of the movement. He twisted and craned his head stepping down the carcass of the first guardian that had been literally minced. The axe in his hand still having gorged bits and chunks of flesh and pulp on it. It was dragging itself because the frangible had torn one of its tendons in its leg. He gripped the axe loosely as he stalked towards the beast and feasted on the confusion in its eyes. It was not human, it didn't comprehend what was going on. Its brain, panicked and it was in flight mode.However it was still dangerous. Nevertheless, Cain mocked it.
"Come on beasty, get to your fucking feet!" He called out to it, waving it towards himself with both hands. He was seething and drooling. Gore and violence had this effect on him.If something was ultra violent, it tapped into his hybrid genetics and brought fully to the surface. It made the world see who was and what he was very capable of doing. It was a side he had to keep under wraps at all times while in a settlement lest he massacre the town. He had done it a time or two when he was younger. Two of the border towns in other sectors seemingly...vanished. When really, he had taken every man, woman, and child and slaughtered them.
Everyone had their coping skills...
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"Okay looks like we have movement out here"
Jack cursed himself for the thousandth time for not bringing a larger gun to this sector, with its locals often being twice his bulk it would certainly help. Still he kept with his KMAG, able to deal high armour piercing if not necessarily wieght of fire. Slowly activating the magnets deep inside the gun, he brought it to bear on the movement picked up by his helmet visuals. Under his armour, the systems in his suit compensate for increasing body-heat and quickening heart, their nerve injectors slowly allowing Jack to enter "combat mode"
Jack had come far from the town of the town of Lactum for this mission, a township calling for an exterminator for their zombie problem, a low-risk, low-reward job with little interest in it for most, but for Jack it opened a window to relations between the towns, and so he had come to do this stupid job.
He had been stalking creatures near the small wasteland "city" of New Aston for several days now, the local militia not wanting to leave the safety of the township's ramshackle walls. He had killed dozens of zombies and even a psychopath in the past week, so obviously something other than smog was in the air. His motion sensor-mines had been ghosting something huge on the outskirts of Manufactorium Bravo, a small ex-production facility hit by a cluster bomb in the late days of the war.
Helmet systems buzzing, a sudden blur of movement cuts across him, a large rodent peaks its head out and scuttles across the floor. "Oh cmon you gotta be kidding me" is heard muttered in the still shell of the factory. At that point the wall next to Jack is blown outwards as if from some leftover bomb, Jack thrown to the ground as a huge man-shaped monster stalks out and screams so loudly that the ground shakes beneath its feet.
Although not much bigger than Jack, its bulk far exceeds his. Two normal human arms appear on the left hand side of its body, a huge misshappen flesh coloured claw on its right. A mouth open, cracked grey lips pull back over sharpened teeth and huge dull eyes filled with primal rage. With its tree trunk legs it charges at superhuman speed towards Jack, barely missing him as he combat rolls away. "Cmon you ugly beast, I can take you easy" he shouts, as he draws his pistol in his right hand while flicking out the blade inlaid on the top of his left vambrace. As it charges next, Jack fires shot after shot into the beast, bullets piercing straight through the beast, seemingly doing no damage. This time, before he has the chance to roll out the way, the best flings a piece of rubble hidden in one of its human hands, striking Jack in the chest. Immediately alarms go off on the readout on Jacks helmet, but silencing them, he stows his pistol and draws a small piton shaped object, and activating some of the subsystems in his armour, he prepares for the creatures next attack.
The creature, obviously frustrated by Jack's continued survival, charges head first at him, mouth open, claw drawn back, ready to impale. As it approaches Jack activates the armours beamlights on full flash, before stabbing the stunned creature with the piton. Withdrawing, he allows the creature one last screech before activating the large fragmentation charge placed in the piton.
"And you thought it wouldnt be handy" he mutters, turning his attention to his fractured ribcage as blooded limbs fall around him...
Jack cursed himself for the thousandth time for not bringing a larger gun to this sector, with its locals often being twice his bulk it would certainly help. Still he kept with his KMAG, able to deal high armour piercing if not necessarily wieght of fire. Slowly activating the magnets deep inside the gun, he brought it to bear on the movement picked up by his helmet visuals. Under his armour, the systems in his suit compensate for increasing body-heat and quickening heart, their nerve injectors slowly allowing Jack to enter "combat mode"
Jack had come far from the town of the town of Lactum for this mission, a township calling for an exterminator for their zombie problem, a low-risk, low-reward job with little interest in it for most, but for Jack it opened a window to relations between the towns, and so he had come to do this stupid job.
He had been stalking creatures near the small wasteland "city" of New Aston for several days now, the local militia not wanting to leave the safety of the township's ramshackle walls. He had killed dozens of zombies and even a psychopath in the past week, so obviously something other than smog was in the air. His motion sensor-mines had been ghosting something huge on the outskirts of Manufactorium Bravo, a small ex-production facility hit by a cluster bomb in the late days of the war.
Helmet systems buzzing, a sudden blur of movement cuts across him, a large rodent peaks its head out and scuttles across the floor. "Oh cmon you gotta be kidding me" is heard muttered in the still shell of the factory. At that point the wall next to Jack is blown outwards as if from some leftover bomb, Jack thrown to the ground as a huge man-shaped monster stalks out and screams so loudly that the ground shakes beneath its feet.
Although not much bigger than Jack, its bulk far exceeds his. Two normal human arms appear on the left hand side of its body, a huge misshappen flesh coloured claw on its right. A mouth open, cracked grey lips pull back over sharpened teeth and huge dull eyes filled with primal rage. With its tree trunk legs it charges at superhuman speed towards Jack, barely missing him as he combat rolls away. "Cmon you ugly beast, I can take you easy" he shouts, as he draws his pistol in his right hand while flicking out the blade inlaid on the top of his left vambrace. As it charges next, Jack fires shot after shot into the beast, bullets piercing straight through the beast, seemingly doing no damage. This time, before he has the chance to roll out the way, the best flings a piece of rubble hidden in one of its human hands, striking Jack in the chest. Immediately alarms go off on the readout on Jacks helmet, but silencing them, he stows his pistol and draws a small piton shaped object, and activating some of the subsystems in his armour, he prepares for the creatures next attack.
The creature, obviously frustrated by Jack's continued survival, charges head first at him, mouth open, claw drawn back, ready to impale. As it approaches Jack activates the armours beamlights on full flash, before stabbing the stunned creature with the piton. Withdrawing, he allows the creature one last screech before activating the large fragmentation charge placed in the piton.
"And you thought it wouldnt be handy" he mutters, turning his attention to his fractured ribcage as blooded limbs fall around him...
Madeline sighed as they sifted through another pile of rubble, they really hadn't found anything of use but this wasn't uncommon places like this were picked over all the time, eventually your not going to find anything.
"Shit! I'm tired of this, every fucking time I find something it crumbles", said Henry as he through down the shovel he was using.
Madeline stood up from the look of the shadows on the ground it was about 1300 hours, "Dad we need to start thinking about finding cover for the night".
Henry turned and looked at Madeline a aggravated look on his face, he knew she was right but he would never admit it. "You found anything?" he asked.
Madeline sighed and walked over to him "I found, what looks like an old tin box, and some old shell casings" she handed him the box with the small casings inside it.
"It's an old lunch box, but we might be able to get something for the casings if someone were willing to refurbish them. It's better then nothing", he closed the lid and stuck the box in his backpack. "Alright lets go find cover for the night", he said as he slung the bag over his shoulder.
Madeline nodded there were some old buildings not too far away so they had plenty of time before the creeps started coming out. Thats when she noticed what looked like red flames, she pulled out her gun and looked through the scope. "Dad what the hell is that?", she asked.
Henry took the gun from her and looked "Well fuck if it ain't flares, I haven't seen shit like that since I left the military. Somebody knows what the hell their doing. Thats really close to the old subway system I bet it's a maintenance tube, I also bet your ass that there's a shit pot load of creeps in there too. Whoever they are they got some balls going in there", said Henry handing the sniper rifle back to his daughter. "Come one we want to stay the fuck away from there" he said as he began to walk in the opposite direction of the flares.
"But dad what if their in trouble and need help?" she asked.
Henry turned and gave his daughter a confused look "So what, if the dumb ass went in there he obviously had a fucking death wish. We don't give a fuck so lets move on, thats and order". Madeline gave him a worried look, Henry growled There's no way in hell I'm helping someone that has the mental capacity of a piss ant. Now lets get the fuck out of here before, those creeps get done with whoever it is and come after us for desert", he said as he turned on his heal and practically began to march away.
Madeline sighed, her father was right but she just had this feeling of shame of leaving someone that might be in need of help. But this was the world they lived in, sometimes people made mistakes that got themselves in trouble, and if you got sentimental or emotional then they were liable to take you with them. Madeline fell into line behind her father and tried to put the same out of her mind, her mother had taught her to try to help those in need and it was a hard thing to unlearn.
"Shit! I'm tired of this, every fucking time I find something it crumbles", said Henry as he through down the shovel he was using.
Madeline stood up from the look of the shadows on the ground it was about 1300 hours, "Dad we need to start thinking about finding cover for the night".
Henry turned and looked at Madeline a aggravated look on his face, he knew she was right but he would never admit it. "You found anything?" he asked.
Madeline sighed and walked over to him "I found, what looks like an old tin box, and some old shell casings" she handed him the box with the small casings inside it.
"It's an old lunch box, but we might be able to get something for the casings if someone were willing to refurbish them. It's better then nothing", he closed the lid and stuck the box in his backpack. "Alright lets go find cover for the night", he said as he slung the bag over his shoulder.
Madeline nodded there were some old buildings not too far away so they had plenty of time before the creeps started coming out. Thats when she noticed what looked like red flames, she pulled out her gun and looked through the scope. "Dad what the hell is that?", she asked.
Henry took the gun from her and looked "Well fuck if it ain't flares, I haven't seen shit like that since I left the military. Somebody knows what the hell their doing. Thats really close to the old subway system I bet it's a maintenance tube, I also bet your ass that there's a shit pot load of creeps in there too. Whoever they are they got some balls going in there", said Henry handing the sniper rifle back to his daughter. "Come one we want to stay the fuck away from there" he said as he began to walk in the opposite direction of the flares.
"But dad what if their in trouble and need help?" she asked.
Henry turned and gave his daughter a confused look "So what, if the dumb ass went in there he obviously had a fucking death wish. We don't give a fuck so lets move on, thats and order". Madeline gave him a worried look, Henry growled There's no way in hell I'm helping someone that has the mental capacity of a piss ant. Now lets get the fuck out of here before, those creeps get done with whoever it is and come after us for desert", he said as he turned on his heal and practically began to march away.
Madeline sighed, her father was right but she just had this feeling of shame of leaving someone that might be in need of help. But this was the world they lived in, sometimes people made mistakes that got themselves in trouble, and if you got sentimental or emotional then they were liable to take you with them. Madeline fell into line behind her father and tried to put the same out of her mind, her mother had taught her to try to help those in need and it was a hard thing to unlearn.
Suddenly, his ears reflexively heard howling in the distance. While he could kill a handful of these bastards with ease, he couldn't kill them all. There were hundreds if not thousands of them in a given nest. One could see it in his face, the frustration of having to quit his "game". He slid the axe back into the modular lightweight load-bearing equipment, MOLLE straps that hung near his hind quarters and slid the shotgun up and back into his hands. Walking over to the creature he, he pressed a boot to its deranged head, and with extreme force--pressed down. It wasn't so much a stomp, as it was similar to gradually applying more and more force until gradually--the bug any everyday person would crush was dead and gone.
He could feel the plates of its skull shifting, slowly shifting beneath his heel until finally, he arched his powerful leg and let forwards. The muscle that was packed into his thigh was incredible; the more he tense the more it became like a compressed spring. But it would be no spring that struck the creature's head, it would me more like a hydraulic jack that did devastating damage; splintered bits of bone and brain matter all combined with the shit one the floor. Cain then walked over to his XM8 and picked it up. He grimaced.
It was all sticky. He hated sticky.
He re-looped the sling around him, settling it behind him as he carried on. He had wasted enough time. He slung the AR around and caught it in his hands. His finger not sliding to trigger the burst of 5.56 rounds loaded, but rather, the 40mm grenade launcher. The high-explosive round waiting in the large-mouthed opening at the end of the barrel eagerly awaited firing. In true Commando style, he 'popped' one of the grenades off. When the propellant was ignited, the higher pressure gases were bled out through vents at reduced pressure to a much larger low pressure chamber pushing the projectile forward. The 40-mm shell, which contained a standard high-explosive grenade with a modified fuze, the cartridge casing contained a heavy cup shape "High Pressure Chamber" in the bottom.
The weapon firing pin struck the percussion primer igniting the propelling charge in the high-pressure chamber. The burning propelling charge generates sufficient pressure to rupture the propellant cup forcing the expanding gases through vent holes into the low-pressure chamber. The rotating band around the projectile engaged the rifling in the launcher tube to impart spin of 3,600 rotations-per-minute to the projectile. The pressure created by the expanding propellant gases in the low-pressure chamber forced the projectile through the launcher barrel with a muzzle velocity of 76 meters per second. The setback force from firing would cause the firing pin in the fuse to be withdrawn from the rotor ball detent, and centrifugal force from projectile rotation caused the rotor ball assembly to align the detonator with the explosive train. The fuse armed after the projectile would traveled approximately 2.4 to 3 meters from the launcher. Upon impact with the target, inertia would cause the inertial ring to act on the push pins, pivoting the levers inward to force the firing pin into the detonator. The detonator ignited the booster charge, and the booster detonated the explosive charge, producing blast and fragmentation of the projectile body.
Their came a deafening blast and the ensuing aftermath he had forged large fireball of his own, which both crumbled the tunnel from which the first set of guardians had come from, and set off the bat winged creatures causing them to create a swirling vortex of bodies as the bat creatures fled into the night skies; screeches would fill the night air as a barrage of flapping wings carried the nimble bodies away and into the ruined cathedrals and skyscrapers that remained. He had scared away the bats, and blocked the most immediate route to the guardians, though it didn't stop them. They could burrow through or come out of one of the many other tunnels.
This was his time to move.
He followed the tracks until he came to a bombed out station area. The growls from behind him told him that more of the guardians were in the vicinity, so he climbed the station platform and with a little effort--scaled the debris that nearly blocked the subway entrance. Clambering out of the stairwell, he was now on the other side of the vast hole that had been gouged. An effort that would have taken several hours longer--perhaps days if one wasn't too careful to avoid the more behemoth classed mutations. Cain's opinion was, if they were bigger than elephant you ran. It didn't matter how bad ass you were elsewhere. Chances were, you were not the bad ass that you thought you were then and there. The highest probability being that their armor rather it be skin, bone or some improvised 'skirt'--was thicker than the biggest bullet you had on you at the time--the level of pain tolerance was vastly and overwhelmingly clear meaning that had you actually made a "dent" it wasn't about to slow down enough to make a difference and lastly but perhaps the most important--he had seen it a thousand times and a thousand times ignorant fools that underestimated the threat their enemies posed proved to be their undoing.
In-fact, that's where most rest of his expeditionary team, had wound up. He had started out with seven in number before he ate the seventh. Six were gone because they were simply idiots and didn't know the first rule of survival. Don't make yourself stand out. If you don't seem like a threat, then you aren't one. If you can't be seen then you can't be eaten. The reason for his pause in the hive, was not because he knew he couldn't kill the enemies--there were just too many enemies for him to kill. He would have, could have spent every clip he had just shooting at targets. Most he would have hit, but those few that he'd have missed--that meant simply that had wasted at least a third of the bullets he was packing. A third of every clip, could easily amount to two full clips.
God, he hated idiots.
But now, his task was before him. He entered the police station. A structure that looked more like an intimidating business center; brandishing forty-six floors in total he wouldn't worry about going up. That wasn't where the fun things were. No, instead he went down and by going down, that meant he pried the elevator doors open and lit a third flare. He dropped it down the shaft. It would either strike the elevator itself eventually, or it would at least help him gauge the depths of the shaft itself.
Surprisingly, it did neither.
When the flare tumbled away, doing the job he had commanded it to--fall. It struck the surfaces of any of the four walls before a distinct sound--the light had gone out suddenly. But in the brevity of the moment, he knew what lie ahead.
Water.
The basement had been flooded. Cain sighed in quiet frustration. He wasn't scared of water. He just didn't like the way it felt against him. Added to that, there was no telling what the threats were down there as he didn't bring a potassium flare with him and with little to no time to build one--he'd have no choice but to say fuck it. A second problem arose. Should he leave his gear here? In the open? He could use a firearm under the water and he'd be heavily encumbered by the sheer weight of his already cumbersome coating of ballistic fibers--which would shrink--steel plating and ceramic tiles.
After a few minutes of self-debating, he grabbed the steel cable that originally held the elevator up, turned around and drew the doors to the elevator closed, took of his beloved armored trench coat, tied it to the cable using the MOLLE system it was devised from, and took the bloody axe handle between his teeth. Without his identifying coat to hide himself, the past years of self-loathing, self-destruction culminating in a perverse sense of self-justification in the shape of scars that reached across his body from both sides exposed his self-mutilation.
He looked like a god damn Frankenstein monster only, the skin was all the same color and was all his body parts attached. He wasn't as big as anyone at first glance would ever give him credit for being. Most simply saw the bulky armor and thought "Well shit, he's got to be pretty fucking beefy under there." That was not the case. He was lean, he didn't even have a "six pack" just a flat, concave stomach. His arms were corded of course, but the solidness of their compact sizes--that was what was deceitful. It belied his brutal nature.
He began shimmying down the extent of the cable, drawing nearer to the water. Before he had begun to descend he drew an empty duffel bag and looped both arms and straddled it against his bare back side. If one were to see him looking down to where he was now, one could see that he too had once began to grow wings. The scars along his shoulder blades foretold of a grueling and barbaric endeavor to allow himself to never reach that level of animal baser instinct.
He could taste the blood of his fellows. Man and beast. He was in a world that didn't believe in one, and wouldn't accept the other. He was a half breed between them; shoved callously in-between a rock and a hard place. Life wasn't about surviving, that was only part of it. It was about coming to terms with he was, what he represented. He was a monument to the human condition and their self-destruction at the hands of the very things they built to keep them safe--were the things in the end to nearly wipe them out. He felt pity for humans, especially those who would mock him with lingering glances. It must have been hard staring into a mirror and realizing on some innate level--this was their fault.
He felt the water swell up around his legs as he began to sink into the murky depths. He took the axe into his hand and switched his hand's grip on the cable be he inhale deeply and plunged. To many, the water would have felt like a thousand sharp, serrated needles piercing the flesh. For Cain though, as long as he had been doing this--practically all of his life-- he hardly felt the old familiar sting. Taking an extensive in hale, he dove under the water, it was strange because there were lights on beneath it, small low-light bulbs that could not permeate past a certain point. Power must not be entirely out in this building.
He swam, by passing floating obstacles; skeleton bodies picked to the bleached bones underneath, office chairs, heavy metal desks. He came to a sub divided wall, a small barred window with a slat, a door adjacent. He bet the door was locked--they always were, how frustrating was that? Instead, he used his musculature power to full effect. Gripping the bars while planting his feet solidly on either side of the wall; the tress was immense, bulging veins along his tightly corded limbs, along his forehead but the cage system was beginning to move and quickly. With a quick burst of full exertion, the segment of wall that held the bars captive gave away.
He discarded the rubble behind him and swam to the vault. Inside he found assault rifles, mostly AR-15's, handguns semi-automatics like model M9 Berettas, a few SIG Sauer P226's, and four Remington 887s with the exception of two Mossenburg 500's. He shoved the shotguns and the hand guns in the bag, while strapping the AR's to his left shoulder. He was running out of air and fast. He quickly made it back out to the hallway, he began to navigate the winding corridors by memory rather than sight because the lights had suddenly failed.
Something bad was about to happen, now wasn't it?
From behind him careened a mutant humanoid. It had fins along its ape-like arms, and its human-like legs. Swiveling around the water, Cain came face to face with this mutant. He had no time to fully think, he was in dangerous territory--it had to be dealt with. He swung his gloved fist which was backed by steel bands beneath the leather and nomex. Slugging the creature had somewhat of a dazed response to it. He wasn't as agile as the abomination was.
It went in for a throat grab, which it got. He quickly anchored Cain to the floor. Cain could feel that rush for survival course through him again; like an adrenaline shot straight through the heart. Endorphins flooding his blood stream causing a whirlwind of euphoria. He could hear his heart beating, thrusting against his rib cage consistently. Dopamine, a major role in the brain system that was responsible for reward-driven learning. Every type of reward that had been studied increased the level of dopamine transmission in the brain, and a variety of highly addictive drugs, including stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine, acted directly on the dopamine system. So when he said every time he killed a man, that it felt like a reward--he meant it. When he said killing every creature he had come across had taught him well--it was true.
Yet through this, his lungs were burning on stale air. His oxygen depletion was high enough without having to fight an enemy. Again, his adrenaline kicked in. He slipped one leg over the creature’s shoulder and contorted the second leg to fit under its jaw. With no time to reach back for his tomahawk, he grabbed the back of the head on this monstrosity, and pulled. It was consistent with a mixed martial arts jujitsu lock. It didn't take long before he could feel the vertebrae 'pop' like small detonations and finally the softer bones of its throat caving in.
The creature jerked, it twitched but it was effectively dismantled. He swam quickly then, he was on the verge of drowning. He entered the shaft and burst through the top of the water. Inhaling vast quantities of air he was smitten with himself. He had gotten what he came for. He could go back to town, to Commando Capacity and sell his treasures. He began to ascend the cable. Keeping his legs tightly bound to the cable while his arms hoisted him up.
After an extensive tug and pull scenario, he finally reached where his clothes were tied to. He stepped to the platform and pried the doors back open before he untied his suit and and set his gear down. He was panting, and heavily. Sweat was dripping from every pore on his body; he wasn't just wet from the water. Though the water did help some, it alleviated the heat his body was taking from all the armor. He sat the duffel bags down, then lay the AR-15's down on top. He went through what most would consider a laborious task and double checking everything before he slung the AR's over one shoulder and grasped the handles of the duffel bag in the other hand and started off for the settlements.
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Out of the wastes of the world outside the gates into the settlement, a figure on the searing hot face of the landscape emerged. A lone figure appeared. Bulky in appearance, the heat waves rising from the ground reflected the image as it tread towards the small makeshift town like an approaching plague. Its faceless façade was cloaked by a veil of thick cloth, black goggles and a combat helmet. He looked like a walking tank with the armament that tirelessly toted with him; assault rifles clanking against each other, the duffel bag strapped to his armored backside as was his shotgun. However, as he encroached further and further inland--it became clear that weapons were not the only thing he was carrying.
The town came to life; a whirlwind of voices--whispered concerns, threats to which he acknowledged none, and those that were curious to see this vagabond. To know if he was the one. The Albino Man, supposedly a hybrid that massacred two towns already. What were they to do? He probably had more guns strapped to him, than the whole town itself. And what was that in his right hand? The two guards outside saw what it was first and were taken back and awe struck. They were afraid, they were terrified and he hadn't even had to do anything--yet. Yes, he held the head of one of the town's very own 'elite'. It was clasped tightly in a gloved hand by the scalp. The face was, desiccated from the extreme temperature of the midday sun. The flesh had a leathery texture to its appearance and as one might have the clear notion--was putrefied. The rotten flesh just barely able to cling to the bleached bone beneath. His face had been chewed on but not completely gone. There were some features.
One grabbed his Colt revolver, the hammer cocking back with the assistance of the man's thumb. To the audible 'clicking' action, Cain simply turned his blanketed face towards the man giving him a subtle reminder. You see, his left hand still had the tomahawk out and the skin textured leather gloves he wore--let out a soft squeal of their own as his fingers tightened around the lever-action handle as if to say ' you pull yours, I'll pull mine' without the utterance of a single word between them. The large, round black eyes of Cain's goggles stared emotionless into the face of a panic stricken man who then tried to lift, aim, and fire at Cain.
However, Cain's eyes watched carefully now. In the brevity of the moment the man took to gain his sights, Cain firmly and swiftly came in arc starting from below and traveling upwards at angle until the hatchet burrowed into, and past the man's temple with a sickening 'crack' as bone splintered. The more sickening thing was, was the man was still alive. Lobotomized, but still breathing. There came a harsh, quick yelp from the second sentry as he fumbled for his gun. His hands were shaking, he had backed up quickly to try and put distance between him and Cain.
Cain reeled, pivoting in a 360 degree manner, tearing away the hatchet and sending the body of the man's partner towards him. They both collapsed, backs to stomach. The man's hand still had a hold of his side arm but as soon as he drew it, his wrist bent inwards. There was a second sickening 'pop'. In the micro second that his wrist bent to withdraw, Cain had stomped on the bent compilation of cartilage and bone. The force of which, was an even more grisly sight as the resonating tremors that vibrated through his bone structure from the tour de force blow had, in effect, blown out the bone causing it to crumple and the flesh be perforated in many angles and ways. This man screamed, yet it was on deaf ears when it came to Cain. The city, however, heard this man's wail like a banshee cry.
"But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." Cain uttered, it was from the Book of Exodus. Taking his tomahawk, he turned back to the gates, walking away with the man's mangled arm causing considerable an irreconcilable pain. He brought his boot up, he kicked the doors ajar, and readily moved into town. A great many people fled in terror when they saw the rotten, half eaten head of a man they had formally known. Cain, carried it to the arms dealer that employed him to begin with. With a baffled look of why everyone was running and this lone man was simply...walking. It too made them very nervous, but it was only the beginning of their horror. Cain simply lifted his hand carrying the disembodied head of their field agents. One threw up immediately, the other backed away very quickly. Cain dropped the head on the counter, letting the ten pounds of flesh and bone bounce and roll towards them before carrying the gear that he had gotten onto his own company.
He could feel the plates of its skull shifting, slowly shifting beneath his heel until finally, he arched his powerful leg and let forwards. The muscle that was packed into his thigh was incredible; the more he tense the more it became like a compressed spring. But it would be no spring that struck the creature's head, it would me more like a hydraulic jack that did devastating damage; splintered bits of bone and brain matter all combined with the shit one the floor. Cain then walked over to his XM8 and picked it up. He grimaced.
It was all sticky. He hated sticky.
He re-looped the sling around him, settling it behind him as he carried on. He had wasted enough time. He slung the AR around and caught it in his hands. His finger not sliding to trigger the burst of 5.56 rounds loaded, but rather, the 40mm grenade launcher. The high-explosive round waiting in the large-mouthed opening at the end of the barrel eagerly awaited firing. In true Commando style, he 'popped' one of the grenades off. When the propellant was ignited, the higher pressure gases were bled out through vents at reduced pressure to a much larger low pressure chamber pushing the projectile forward. The 40-mm shell, which contained a standard high-explosive grenade with a modified fuze, the cartridge casing contained a heavy cup shape "High Pressure Chamber" in the bottom.
The weapon firing pin struck the percussion primer igniting the propelling charge in the high-pressure chamber. The burning propelling charge generates sufficient pressure to rupture the propellant cup forcing the expanding gases through vent holes into the low-pressure chamber. The rotating band around the projectile engaged the rifling in the launcher tube to impart spin of 3,600 rotations-per-minute to the projectile. The pressure created by the expanding propellant gases in the low-pressure chamber forced the projectile through the launcher barrel with a muzzle velocity of 76 meters per second. The setback force from firing would cause the firing pin in the fuse to be withdrawn from the rotor ball detent, and centrifugal force from projectile rotation caused the rotor ball assembly to align the detonator with the explosive train. The fuse armed after the projectile would traveled approximately 2.4 to 3 meters from the launcher. Upon impact with the target, inertia would cause the inertial ring to act on the push pins, pivoting the levers inward to force the firing pin into the detonator. The detonator ignited the booster charge, and the booster detonated the explosive charge, producing blast and fragmentation of the projectile body.
Their came a deafening blast and the ensuing aftermath he had forged large fireball of his own, which both crumbled the tunnel from which the first set of guardians had come from, and set off the bat winged creatures causing them to create a swirling vortex of bodies as the bat creatures fled into the night skies; screeches would fill the night air as a barrage of flapping wings carried the nimble bodies away and into the ruined cathedrals and skyscrapers that remained. He had scared away the bats, and blocked the most immediate route to the guardians, though it didn't stop them. They could burrow through or come out of one of the many other tunnels.
This was his time to move.
He followed the tracks until he came to a bombed out station area. The growls from behind him told him that more of the guardians were in the vicinity, so he climbed the station platform and with a little effort--scaled the debris that nearly blocked the subway entrance. Clambering out of the stairwell, he was now on the other side of the vast hole that had been gouged. An effort that would have taken several hours longer--perhaps days if one wasn't too careful to avoid the more behemoth classed mutations. Cain's opinion was, if they were bigger than elephant you ran. It didn't matter how bad ass you were elsewhere. Chances were, you were not the bad ass that you thought you were then and there. The highest probability being that their armor rather it be skin, bone or some improvised 'skirt'--was thicker than the biggest bullet you had on you at the time--the level of pain tolerance was vastly and overwhelmingly clear meaning that had you actually made a "dent" it wasn't about to slow down enough to make a difference and lastly but perhaps the most important--he had seen it a thousand times and a thousand times ignorant fools that underestimated the threat their enemies posed proved to be their undoing.
In-fact, that's where most rest of his expeditionary team, had wound up. He had started out with seven in number before he ate the seventh. Six were gone because they were simply idiots and didn't know the first rule of survival. Don't make yourself stand out. If you don't seem like a threat, then you aren't one. If you can't be seen then you can't be eaten. The reason for his pause in the hive, was not because he knew he couldn't kill the enemies--there were just too many enemies for him to kill. He would have, could have spent every clip he had just shooting at targets. Most he would have hit, but those few that he'd have missed--that meant simply that had wasted at least a third of the bullets he was packing. A third of every clip, could easily amount to two full clips.
God, he hated idiots.
But now, his task was before him. He entered the police station. A structure that looked more like an intimidating business center; brandishing forty-six floors in total he wouldn't worry about going up. That wasn't where the fun things were. No, instead he went down and by going down, that meant he pried the elevator doors open and lit a third flare. He dropped it down the shaft. It would either strike the elevator itself eventually, or it would at least help him gauge the depths of the shaft itself.
Surprisingly, it did neither.
When the flare tumbled away, doing the job he had commanded it to--fall. It struck the surfaces of any of the four walls before a distinct sound--the light had gone out suddenly. But in the brevity of the moment, he knew what lie ahead.
Water.
The basement had been flooded. Cain sighed in quiet frustration. He wasn't scared of water. He just didn't like the way it felt against him. Added to that, there was no telling what the threats were down there as he didn't bring a potassium flare with him and with little to no time to build one--he'd have no choice but to say fuck it. A second problem arose. Should he leave his gear here? In the open? He could use a firearm under the water and he'd be heavily encumbered by the sheer weight of his already cumbersome coating of ballistic fibers--which would shrink--steel plating and ceramic tiles.
After a few minutes of self-debating, he grabbed the steel cable that originally held the elevator up, turned around and drew the doors to the elevator closed, took of his beloved armored trench coat, tied it to the cable using the MOLLE system it was devised from, and took the bloody axe handle between his teeth. Without his identifying coat to hide himself, the past years of self-loathing, self-destruction culminating in a perverse sense of self-justification in the shape of scars that reached across his body from both sides exposed his self-mutilation.
He looked like a god damn Frankenstein monster only, the skin was all the same color and was all his body parts attached. He wasn't as big as anyone at first glance would ever give him credit for being. Most simply saw the bulky armor and thought "Well shit, he's got to be pretty fucking beefy under there." That was not the case. He was lean, he didn't even have a "six pack" just a flat, concave stomach. His arms were corded of course, but the solidness of their compact sizes--that was what was deceitful. It belied his brutal nature.
He began shimmying down the extent of the cable, drawing nearer to the water. Before he had begun to descend he drew an empty duffel bag and looped both arms and straddled it against his bare back side. If one were to see him looking down to where he was now, one could see that he too had once began to grow wings. The scars along his shoulder blades foretold of a grueling and barbaric endeavor to allow himself to never reach that level of animal baser instinct.
He could taste the blood of his fellows. Man and beast. He was in a world that didn't believe in one, and wouldn't accept the other. He was a half breed between them; shoved callously in-between a rock and a hard place. Life wasn't about surviving, that was only part of it. It was about coming to terms with he was, what he represented. He was a monument to the human condition and their self-destruction at the hands of the very things they built to keep them safe--were the things in the end to nearly wipe them out. He felt pity for humans, especially those who would mock him with lingering glances. It must have been hard staring into a mirror and realizing on some innate level--this was their fault.
He felt the water swell up around his legs as he began to sink into the murky depths. He took the axe into his hand and switched his hand's grip on the cable be he inhale deeply and plunged. To many, the water would have felt like a thousand sharp, serrated needles piercing the flesh. For Cain though, as long as he had been doing this--practically all of his life-- he hardly felt the old familiar sting. Taking an extensive in hale, he dove under the water, it was strange because there were lights on beneath it, small low-light bulbs that could not permeate past a certain point. Power must not be entirely out in this building.
He swam, by passing floating obstacles; skeleton bodies picked to the bleached bones underneath, office chairs, heavy metal desks. He came to a sub divided wall, a small barred window with a slat, a door adjacent. He bet the door was locked--they always were, how frustrating was that? Instead, he used his musculature power to full effect. Gripping the bars while planting his feet solidly on either side of the wall; the tress was immense, bulging veins along his tightly corded limbs, along his forehead but the cage system was beginning to move and quickly. With a quick burst of full exertion, the segment of wall that held the bars captive gave away.
He discarded the rubble behind him and swam to the vault. Inside he found assault rifles, mostly AR-15's, handguns semi-automatics like model M9 Berettas, a few SIG Sauer P226's, and four Remington 887s with the exception of two Mossenburg 500's. He shoved the shotguns and the hand guns in the bag, while strapping the AR's to his left shoulder. He was running out of air and fast. He quickly made it back out to the hallway, he began to navigate the winding corridors by memory rather than sight because the lights had suddenly failed.
Something bad was about to happen, now wasn't it?
From behind him careened a mutant humanoid. It had fins along its ape-like arms, and its human-like legs. Swiveling around the water, Cain came face to face with this mutant. He had no time to fully think, he was in dangerous territory--it had to be dealt with. He swung his gloved fist which was backed by steel bands beneath the leather and nomex. Slugging the creature had somewhat of a dazed response to it. He wasn't as agile as the abomination was.
It went in for a throat grab, which it got. He quickly anchored Cain to the floor. Cain could feel that rush for survival course through him again; like an adrenaline shot straight through the heart. Endorphins flooding his blood stream causing a whirlwind of euphoria. He could hear his heart beating, thrusting against his rib cage consistently. Dopamine, a major role in the brain system that was responsible for reward-driven learning. Every type of reward that had been studied increased the level of dopamine transmission in the brain, and a variety of highly addictive drugs, including stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine, acted directly on the dopamine system. So when he said every time he killed a man, that it felt like a reward--he meant it. When he said killing every creature he had come across had taught him well--it was true.
Yet through this, his lungs were burning on stale air. His oxygen depletion was high enough without having to fight an enemy. Again, his adrenaline kicked in. He slipped one leg over the creature’s shoulder and contorted the second leg to fit under its jaw. With no time to reach back for his tomahawk, he grabbed the back of the head on this monstrosity, and pulled. It was consistent with a mixed martial arts jujitsu lock. It didn't take long before he could feel the vertebrae 'pop' like small detonations and finally the softer bones of its throat caving in.
The creature jerked, it twitched but it was effectively dismantled. He swam quickly then, he was on the verge of drowning. He entered the shaft and burst through the top of the water. Inhaling vast quantities of air he was smitten with himself. He had gotten what he came for. He could go back to town, to Commando Capacity and sell his treasures. He began to ascend the cable. Keeping his legs tightly bound to the cable while his arms hoisted him up.
After an extensive tug and pull scenario, he finally reached where his clothes were tied to. He stepped to the platform and pried the doors back open before he untied his suit and and set his gear down. He was panting, and heavily. Sweat was dripping from every pore on his body; he wasn't just wet from the water. Though the water did help some, it alleviated the heat his body was taking from all the armor. He sat the duffel bags down, then lay the AR-15's down on top. He went through what most would consider a laborious task and double checking everything before he slung the AR's over one shoulder and grasped the handles of the duffel bag in the other hand and started off for the settlements.
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Out of the wastes of the world outside the gates into the settlement, a figure on the searing hot face of the landscape emerged. A lone figure appeared. Bulky in appearance, the heat waves rising from the ground reflected the image as it tread towards the small makeshift town like an approaching plague. Its faceless façade was cloaked by a veil of thick cloth, black goggles and a combat helmet. He looked like a walking tank with the armament that tirelessly toted with him; assault rifles clanking against each other, the duffel bag strapped to his armored backside as was his shotgun. However, as he encroached further and further inland--it became clear that weapons were not the only thing he was carrying.
The town came to life; a whirlwind of voices--whispered concerns, threats to which he acknowledged none, and those that were curious to see this vagabond. To know if he was the one. The Albino Man, supposedly a hybrid that massacred two towns already. What were they to do? He probably had more guns strapped to him, than the whole town itself. And what was that in his right hand? The two guards outside saw what it was first and were taken back and awe struck. They were afraid, they were terrified and he hadn't even had to do anything--yet. Yes, he held the head of one of the town's very own 'elite'. It was clasped tightly in a gloved hand by the scalp. The face was, desiccated from the extreme temperature of the midday sun. The flesh had a leathery texture to its appearance and as one might have the clear notion--was putrefied. The rotten flesh just barely able to cling to the bleached bone beneath. His face had been chewed on but not completely gone. There were some features.
One grabbed his Colt revolver, the hammer cocking back with the assistance of the man's thumb. To the audible 'clicking' action, Cain simply turned his blanketed face towards the man giving him a subtle reminder. You see, his left hand still had the tomahawk out and the skin textured leather gloves he wore--let out a soft squeal of their own as his fingers tightened around the lever-action handle as if to say ' you pull yours, I'll pull mine' without the utterance of a single word between them. The large, round black eyes of Cain's goggles stared emotionless into the face of a panic stricken man who then tried to lift, aim, and fire at Cain.
However, Cain's eyes watched carefully now. In the brevity of the moment the man took to gain his sights, Cain firmly and swiftly came in arc starting from below and traveling upwards at angle until the hatchet burrowed into, and past the man's temple with a sickening 'crack' as bone splintered. The more sickening thing was, was the man was still alive. Lobotomized, but still breathing. There came a harsh, quick yelp from the second sentry as he fumbled for his gun. His hands were shaking, he had backed up quickly to try and put distance between him and Cain.
Cain reeled, pivoting in a 360 degree manner, tearing away the hatchet and sending the body of the man's partner towards him. They both collapsed, backs to stomach. The man's hand still had a hold of his side arm but as soon as he drew it, his wrist bent inwards. There was a second sickening 'pop'. In the micro second that his wrist bent to withdraw, Cain had stomped on the bent compilation of cartilage and bone. The force of which, was an even more grisly sight as the resonating tremors that vibrated through his bone structure from the tour de force blow had, in effect, blown out the bone causing it to crumple and the flesh be perforated in many angles and ways. This man screamed, yet it was on deaf ears when it came to Cain. The city, however, heard this man's wail like a banshee cry.
"But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." Cain uttered, it was from the Book of Exodus. Taking his tomahawk, he turned back to the gates, walking away with the man's mangled arm causing considerable an irreconcilable pain. He brought his boot up, he kicked the doors ajar, and readily moved into town. A great many people fled in terror when they saw the rotten, half eaten head of a man they had formally known. Cain, carried it to the arms dealer that employed him to begin with. With a baffled look of why everyone was running and this lone man was simply...walking. It too made them very nervous, but it was only the beginning of their horror. Cain simply lifted his hand carrying the disembodied head of their field agents. One threw up immediately, the other backed away very quickly. Cain dropped the head on the counter, letting the ten pounds of flesh and bone bounce and roll towards them before carrying the gear that he had gotten onto his own company.
Ryan looked at the sky, noticing how it was slowly darkening, and he sighed to himself, his breath being muffled by his bandana. He had been traveling for at least 3 days now, following the leads on his newest bounty. This one was apparently going to get him about 5 gas tanks with additional cash - aka must be one bad ass person with a freaking high bounty. However, he knew that lack of sleep would eventually overtake him, with his record being 5 days awake. As he readjusted the goggles on his face, Pat made a little noise beside him and he nodded. It was probably time to stop for something.
He slowly stopped his jeep in the middle of... somewhere, the dust cloud finally catching up with his jeep. He hopped out - since using the doors was too time consuming - and took his hat off to remove his glasses. While he did, his white hair seemed to jump at the opportunity to move, flowing slightly in the light breeze. Argo jumped out of the jeep as well, barking as Pat just climbed onto the hood. Ryan shook his head and threw the goggles onto the front seat, and he pulled his bandana down while he walked to the rear. Once there, he grabbed a case that held some of the food and opened it, revealling a piece of stale bread and some form of meat that he couldn't identify. It was remarkable how much Pat and Argo had adapted to the harsher climate, with Argo becoming entirely an omnivore, while Pat could survive off little food just as Ryan had taught himself to.
While he fed his 2 companions, his mind drifted off to 3 days ago when he brought in his last bounty and nearly got shafted in the process:
With the muffled sounds of anger and resentment still being made by the female target in the back, Ryan had pulled up to the store front quite pleased with himself. She was apparently a very elusive woman, for she had posed as a man in many places she had went, but Ryan had found her in only 4 days. He easily restrained her - hence the reason she was still alive - and drove back as fast as possible to receive the bounty. However, when he got there there were 3 other bounty hunters that he had seen before, 2 males and a female - the only reason he could remember her was that she was bulkier than the others, which he found slightly humorous. When Ryan pulled up, however, they were all in quite foul moods, and he soon found out that they were all mad at HIM. They nearly stole his tied up target and threatened him when the contractor finally halted everyone and explained to Ryan the circumstances.
The other 3 were claiming that they had claimed the bounty for themselves and went on the mission, but brought in the wrong person. When they realized that Ryan had taken the job when the price had rised, they instantly became suspicious of him double crossing the rules and actually working with the target, whom he caught a little too fast. Ryan at first scoffed at their misconceptions, but they pressed on. They claimed that he was sleeping with the target and that he would eventually free her later, and that was when Ryan lost it on them. After only 3 minutes, guns were pointing in all directions. Finally, they all decided that it was the contractor's decision. Feeling very afraid of 4 very annoyed bounty hunters, he wanted to compromise and say that the bounty was off and that the woman could go free. That didn't settle well with Ryan, not after the reward that he had been promised was the only reason he went after the target: The contractor was going to be giving up 3 gas cans and 2 weeks worth of food, along with a few silver items. After another 10 minutes of squabbling and anarchy, they all reached a decision, one that didn't really make any of them happy: The 2 other guys would split the gas, the lady would get the food and Ryan would get the silver.
Ryan sighed, unhappy with how his last job had went, and knowing that he was getting low on gas, knew that either the target or the contractor better have gas, or he would be pissed. He leaned against the jeep, completely oblivious to his surroundings, and not really caring. It was a barren wasteland with rubble everywhere, what was there to see anymore?
He slowly stopped his jeep in the middle of... somewhere, the dust cloud finally catching up with his jeep. He hopped out - since using the doors was too time consuming - and took his hat off to remove his glasses. While he did, his white hair seemed to jump at the opportunity to move, flowing slightly in the light breeze. Argo jumped out of the jeep as well, barking as Pat just climbed onto the hood. Ryan shook his head and threw the goggles onto the front seat, and he pulled his bandana down while he walked to the rear. Once there, he grabbed a case that held some of the food and opened it, revealling a piece of stale bread and some form of meat that he couldn't identify. It was remarkable how much Pat and Argo had adapted to the harsher climate, with Argo becoming entirely an omnivore, while Pat could survive off little food just as Ryan had taught himself to.
While he fed his 2 companions, his mind drifted off to 3 days ago when he brought in his last bounty and nearly got shafted in the process:
With the muffled sounds of anger and resentment still being made by the female target in the back, Ryan had pulled up to the store front quite pleased with himself. She was apparently a very elusive woman, for she had posed as a man in many places she had went, but Ryan had found her in only 4 days. He easily restrained her - hence the reason she was still alive - and drove back as fast as possible to receive the bounty. However, when he got there there were 3 other bounty hunters that he had seen before, 2 males and a female - the only reason he could remember her was that she was bulkier than the others, which he found slightly humorous. When Ryan pulled up, however, they were all in quite foul moods, and he soon found out that they were all mad at HIM. They nearly stole his tied up target and threatened him when the contractor finally halted everyone and explained to Ryan the circumstances.
The other 3 were claiming that they had claimed the bounty for themselves and went on the mission, but brought in the wrong person. When they realized that Ryan had taken the job when the price had rised, they instantly became suspicious of him double crossing the rules and actually working with the target, whom he caught a little too fast. Ryan at first scoffed at their misconceptions, but they pressed on. They claimed that he was sleeping with the target and that he would eventually free her later, and that was when Ryan lost it on them. After only 3 minutes, guns were pointing in all directions. Finally, they all decided that it was the contractor's decision. Feeling very afraid of 4 very annoyed bounty hunters, he wanted to compromise and say that the bounty was off and that the woman could go free. That didn't settle well with Ryan, not after the reward that he had been promised was the only reason he went after the target: The contractor was going to be giving up 3 gas cans and 2 weeks worth of food, along with a few silver items. After another 10 minutes of squabbling and anarchy, they all reached a decision, one that didn't really make any of them happy: The 2 other guys would split the gas, the lady would get the food and Ryan would get the silver.
Ryan sighed, unhappy with how his last job had went, and knowing that he was getting low on gas, knew that either the target or the contractor better have gas, or he would be pissed. He leaned against the jeep, completely oblivious to his surroundings, and not really caring. It was a barren wasteland with rubble everywhere, what was there to see anymore?
"Damn I thought we'd never get here. I swear to God old man your calculations on distance suck" said Madeline as she adjusted the strap of the pack on her shoulder.
"Don't be such a pussy, we still got here didn't we. An now we can find out if any of that shit we turned up is worth a damn" said Henry who was walking just ahead of her.
Madeline rolled her eye, her father forgot he was talking to a girl sometimes and the comment of someone being a "pussy" really didn't hold the insult it would with a man. But he was old and set in his ways, and had spent the vast majority of his adult life giving orders and insults to men, "I really need to teach you some better insults" she said mockingly under her breath.
As they walked up to settlement where the weapons dealer resided, it wasn't the only one around but it was the closest. Madeline would be glad to have a place to sleep for the night that didn't involve jumping at every sound she heard in the darkness. Even though the settlements had there own evils to fear, and sometimes the people who are living are worse then the mutant creeps that roam the wastes.
Madeline was looking around when she was stopped by her father "Somethings not right we should have been patted down by gate guards by now..."
He was right the settlement was eerily silent even getting this late in the evening there would still be people milling around, trying to secure things for the night. Madeline pulled the gun off her back, the sniper rifle wasn't much good in close quarters combat, but it still got the job done when she wasn't able to find a vantage point quickly enough.
They soon came across a gory sight, the smell of blood clung sickly in the air Madeline could see people with aghast looks on their face hiding in the surrounding buildings "Well I think these poor schmucks are the guards" she said "They look like they got the bad end of a hatchet or something". One of the men was barely breathing and slowly dyeing the other looked even worse with his arm gruesomely ripped off. Both men were going to die... there were a couple of pops and the deed was done. Henry reloaded his his gun after putting the poor guys out of their misery, and then he turned towards the weapon dealers compound.
"It was the Albino Man..." Madeline turned at the sound of a mousy little voice behind her, the woman was obviously a "working girl", her breasts spilling out of the dirty tattered shirt she was wearing. "He just came in like a maniac and took out the guards. Then he headed for the weapons compound" when Madeline got a good look at the girl who wasn't much older then herself, she was saddened to see the burned flesh on her face. Like someone had taken a hot branding iron to her cheek for what means Madeline couldn't surmise. The burn had healed horribly was oozing puss and gave off a horrid smell, Madeline was disgusted with whoever could do something like that to anyone let alone an innocent young woman. It's changed her first thought when this girl started talking to her, she wasn't a whore she was a slave. Some other unhealthy looking men came and began to ransack the two dead men and the girl scurried away with a bit of money she had pulled out of the guards pockets.
Madeline shook her head and caught up to her father who was almost to the gates of the compound "Sir, the culprit is in there are we still going in" she said.
Henry turned back and looked at her "Damn straight we are, we need the money dammit..." It was then a very large man came out of the bunker. He was massive, and the armor he was wearing just made him look bigger. Madeline and her father stood before him, she kept waiting for her father to pull back and let the man aside but he didn't. Surely he was nuts, well she knew that but this was suicide "Saw your handiwork back there... so how much money did they cheat you out of" said Henry with a smirk.
Madeline's eyes went wide, how could he talk so nonchalantly to this guy that had practically murdered those guards "Sir,shouldn't we let him past" she said in anxious tone of voice.
Henry shrugged her arm off "Shut the hell up I'm trying to figure out who he's working for so we can maybe get some work and not starve to death" he was aggravated with her and she knew it. Madeline looked down at the ground "Yes sir", she kept glancing up at the man, the girl had called him the Albino Man but it was hard to tell under all the armor, but that would explain why he would cover himself like that. Obviously at one point she had seen him without some of the armor to know. Madeline cringed at the thought, how could anyone... she didn't want to think of it.
"Don't be such a pussy, we still got here didn't we. An now we can find out if any of that shit we turned up is worth a damn" said Henry who was walking just ahead of her.
Madeline rolled her eye, her father forgot he was talking to a girl sometimes and the comment of someone being a "pussy" really didn't hold the insult it would with a man. But he was old and set in his ways, and had spent the vast majority of his adult life giving orders and insults to men, "I really need to teach you some better insults" she said mockingly under her breath.
As they walked up to settlement where the weapons dealer resided, it wasn't the only one around but it was the closest. Madeline would be glad to have a place to sleep for the night that didn't involve jumping at every sound she heard in the darkness. Even though the settlements had there own evils to fear, and sometimes the people who are living are worse then the mutant creeps that roam the wastes.
Madeline was looking around when she was stopped by her father "Somethings not right we should have been patted down by gate guards by now..."
He was right the settlement was eerily silent even getting this late in the evening there would still be people milling around, trying to secure things for the night. Madeline pulled the gun off her back, the sniper rifle wasn't much good in close quarters combat, but it still got the job done when she wasn't able to find a vantage point quickly enough.
They soon came across a gory sight, the smell of blood clung sickly in the air Madeline could see people with aghast looks on their face hiding in the surrounding buildings "Well I think these poor schmucks are the guards" she said "They look like they got the bad end of a hatchet or something". One of the men was barely breathing and slowly dyeing the other looked even worse with his arm gruesomely ripped off. Both men were going to die... there were a couple of pops and the deed was done. Henry reloaded his his gun after putting the poor guys out of their misery, and then he turned towards the weapon dealers compound.
"It was the Albino Man..." Madeline turned at the sound of a mousy little voice behind her, the woman was obviously a "working girl", her breasts spilling out of the dirty tattered shirt she was wearing. "He just came in like a maniac and took out the guards. Then he headed for the weapons compound" when Madeline got a good look at the girl who wasn't much older then herself, she was saddened to see the burned flesh on her face. Like someone had taken a hot branding iron to her cheek for what means Madeline couldn't surmise. The burn had healed horribly was oozing puss and gave off a horrid smell, Madeline was disgusted with whoever could do something like that to anyone let alone an innocent young woman. It's changed her first thought when this girl started talking to her, she wasn't a whore she was a slave. Some other unhealthy looking men came and began to ransack the two dead men and the girl scurried away with a bit of money she had pulled out of the guards pockets.
Madeline shook her head and caught up to her father who was almost to the gates of the compound "Sir, the culprit is in there are we still going in" she said.
Henry turned back and looked at her "Damn straight we are, we need the money dammit..." It was then a very large man came out of the bunker. He was massive, and the armor he was wearing just made him look bigger. Madeline and her father stood before him, she kept waiting for her father to pull back and let the man aside but he didn't. Surely he was nuts, well she knew that but this was suicide "Saw your handiwork back there... so how much money did they cheat you out of" said Henry with a smirk.
Madeline's eyes went wide, how could he talk so nonchalantly to this guy that had practically murdered those guards "Sir,shouldn't we let him past" she said in anxious tone of voice.
Henry shrugged her arm off "Shut the hell up I'm trying to figure out who he's working for so we can maybe get some work and not starve to death" he was aggravated with her and she knew it. Madeline looked down at the ground "Yes sir", she kept glancing up at the man, the girl had called him the Albino Man but it was hard to tell under all the armor, but that would explain why he would cover himself like that. Obviously at one point she had seen him without some of the armor to know. Madeline cringed at the thought, how could anyone... she didn't want to think of it.
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Once Cain stepped away from the bunker, he pivoted guiding his body to thus turn around in his preconceived pattern of motion. When he was confronted, he had gotten himself a new trinket for his assault rifle. The sleek rifle took after the G36 rifle as far as the outer look went. It had an under-mounted grenade-launcher M320 that could dispense 40mm grenade types. The rifle itself fired a much larger round, a 7.62 a 30mm round. It had the assaulter barrel installed, a 12" cold hammer forged and chrome-lined barrel and utilized a conventional lands and grooves bore profile with a 279.4 mm twist rate. They were designed to function reliably with bullet weights ranging from less than 11.34gs. The barrel had been accurized, meaning, that it was made in such a way that the bullet could achieve its absolute maximum potential for accuracy. The tip was threaded with a muzzle break. Which meant it was very, very loud but the effective recoil would be reduced tremendously.
Attached to his MOLLE webbed armor, were the two other barrels. A 16" Recce accurized barrel and a 20" Sniper barrel that was accurized as well. The XM8 was designed more for use as a "designated marksman" rifle than an assault rifle, with its increased cost, accuracy, penetrative power and effective range weighed against decreased rate of fire and magazine capacity although fully automatic fire is selectable. He looked up into the face of the man that was standing slightly below him as there were stairs to ascend to get to the bunker. He looked raggedy and worn, a well fared traveler of the wastes and from the glean in his eye--seen his fair share of action.
"Saw your handiwork back there... so how much money did they cheat you out of" Cain released the cocking bolt letting it jettison forwards--loading the rifle.
"Cheat me? Oh yes, lets see, both tried to pull their gun, both threatened me, but only one shot at me. So, I stole the life of one, and took the arm of another because he only drew his weapon. I suppose you could say he tried to cheat me out of my life." A voice, although muffled was still daunting to hear him speak so openly about what he had done. "The Lord says, there shall be an eye for an eye." Cain spoke plainly to Henry, though Henry could not see the eyes that were behind the thick dark goggles he would get an unsettling feeling about Cain. Like he were an animal prowling.
Cain looked down further when he heard a second voice: "Sir,shouldn't we let him past" . When Henry had shrugged her off commenting "Shut the hell up I'm trying to figure out who he's working for so we can maybe get some work and not starve to death" It was all Cain needed to intercede.
"Ah, family. Such a lost artifact in these desperate times," He said, his blank facade staring right at Madaline herself. "You had best keep an eye on her, lest raiders get her. Then she'll be split from ass to crotch and begging for death long before it over. That is, if she doesn't learn to enjoy it first--some of them girls, they lose more than their souls. They lose their minds and begin to think its just another way of life." Cain spoke callously, but truthfully.
They were cut off by a shout, a crowd had formed and the local sheriff and the deputy had come to arrest Cain for his deeds. But they would all soon find out there was no resistance, just a cold calculating man with a terrible penchant for violence. There was a cocking of hammers as the two me--one young and one old. One tried and true and one just tried. The younger man in his eagerness got to Cain first, unknowing of what the man could really do. He thought he was safe with a loaded weapon. He was sorely mistaken.
The deputy ran up to Cain, holding his gun recklessly out and away from his own center of gravity. He mine as well have handed Cain the gun. He waited for the older man to get to him before he too pointed his handgun at Cain.
"Cain, we're here to arrest you." The sheriff said, heaving.
"Arrest me, my my whatever for?" Cain's covered face looked over at Henry--Henry could tell there was a smile somewhere behind the mask.
" Now you know what for, killing those two men the men outside the gates!" The sheriff continued to play the part of the fool.
" Oh, those men. Yes well, they shouldn't have trespassed on me. See, they drew their weapons on me. I didn't like that. Just like you are now." Cain retorted, the tone of his voice noticeably changing, slowly metamorphosing into something sinister.
"You were carrying a damn head!" The sheriff yelled out.
"Oh, that little thing?" Just warning to a company I worked for--I don't care much for babysitting. Out there its survival of the fittest, if you can't keep up--you die. You're no good to me dead, least he was good enough to give me a snack." Cain said slyly, much to the appalled crowd.
This had gotten the sheriff upset enough to lift his arm and slowly bring it d own to straighten it out leaving only the barrel mere inches from Cain's face. Like a viper he would strike. Cain lurched forwards, and the man went to shoot. Time stood still, but there was no bang. Cain had cleverly caught the six-shooter revolver in-between the hammer and the primer. The thick padding of his gloves kept his fingers from being crushed. His other hand had caught the man's wrist. Without hesitating, Cain made him blast the deputy in the leg by pulling his glove fro between the hammer and the primer which dropped the kid to the ground immediately screaming and writhing. He was no gung-ho shooter. Fresh tears welling in his eyes. Cain the turned the gun on the sheriff himself--speaking in contemptuous tones.
"Everyone is a sinner sheriff...Even you."Cain squeezed the hand of the sheriff's gun hand forcing him to fire off a round into his own shoulder. The sheriff would gasp as the wound was not fatal but punishing in terms of pain. Cain turned to the side, pinning the sheriff up against the wall. With his gloves one, Cain penetrated the bullet hole finding the tendon which drew on the man tendons in the mans arm and hand. Cain stabilized the gun with his other hand. He then remotely controlled the man's arm with just his fingers.
"Which sinner should we send to hell first sheriff?" Cain questioned, bringing the barrel to a woman. "The prostitute who gives her body away for pittance?"
Cain redirected the barrel to a man. " The gambler who throws it all away for greedy schemes?"
Cain switched again, this time to an actual shady looking fellow. "The crimelord whose money you've been taking in bribes and favors?" Cain then made the barrel of the gun slowly shift, redirecting it and placing it under the man's jaw, along the fleshy part just between the V-shape of his thick fatty throat. The man was blubbering.
"I'm, I'm, I'm sorry..." The sheriff sobbed both from pain and fear. It was evident on the man's face. Cain had a w ay of seeing past people's facades, of knowing their darkest secrets just by watching them, listening to them; the way they talked, the way they breathed and the way their felt beating inside.
"You should be." A loud 'crack' and the sheriffs brains were cemented all over the wall of the shop. He let the man's lifeless body tumble down the steps and roll out at the bottom. He then turned to Henry, and withdrew something wrapped in old newspapers. It smelled putrid. He placed it in Henry's hand and immediately, he would know what it was--a human hand. "Beggars can't be choosers, right?" Cain would remark about Henry's being hungry but that was only the half of it.
Despite being a ruthless son of a bitch, he never once showed a hint of conceit or condescension. He didn't even hold that "I'm better than you" feel about him, but his presence--his words spoke for themselves and in milestones. This was about Henry's complacency with Cain. This could be further elaborated on by the fact that as he passed Madaline, he slid her the currency to the town--to any town really. A golden nugget. Cain Simply stepped past the two, sauntering towards the helpless boy. He stopped.
"I'm going to give you a choice that will affect you for the rest of your life.You can either give me your hand, or give me your life." Cain said coldly, His hand had taken a hold of something, and it wasn't a gun. It was a tomahawk, slipped from the webbing of his armor's MOLLE system. The boy held one hand up as to defend himself.
"I'm sorry mister, I'm sorry!" He cried, he sobbed.
"It's too bad apologies don't reconcile tribulation. Only blood can save you now." Cain replied.
The boys face twisted in agony, as he laid his head down flush with the ground and slid his right hand outwards slowly, timidly. Sprawling his fingers out, he relished the last time he would feel with that hand again. A boot slowly pressed down on the back of the palm. The blow came so swiftly--even the boy who had his eyes closed and was waiting for it--could not feel it. Once he opened his eyes he stared at a bloody stump of what used to be a hand and wrist. The axe had cut cleanly through the flesh and bone. Cain held the boys hand in his free hand. It took a minute fore the sever pain to kick in--with adrenaline pumping rampant through his body.
"Oh," Cain turned back to Henry. "If you think you can keep up, I'm going out on a mission. Just keep in mind--I go where no man dares tread." He told Henry firmly, before taking the hand. The boy had begun to scream even wilder now. "Get this boy straightened up, don't need him bleeding to death." Cain said simply, walking on.
Attached to his MOLLE webbed armor, were the two other barrels. A 16" Recce accurized barrel and a 20" Sniper barrel that was accurized as well. The XM8 was designed more for use as a "designated marksman" rifle than an assault rifle, with its increased cost, accuracy, penetrative power and effective range weighed against decreased rate of fire and magazine capacity although fully automatic fire is selectable. He looked up into the face of the man that was standing slightly below him as there were stairs to ascend to get to the bunker. He looked raggedy and worn, a well fared traveler of the wastes and from the glean in his eye--seen his fair share of action.
"Saw your handiwork back there... so how much money did they cheat you out of" Cain released the cocking bolt letting it jettison forwards--loading the rifle.
"Cheat me? Oh yes, lets see, both tried to pull their gun, both threatened me, but only one shot at me. So, I stole the life of one, and took the arm of another because he only drew his weapon. I suppose you could say he tried to cheat me out of my life." A voice, although muffled was still daunting to hear him speak so openly about what he had done. "The Lord says, there shall be an eye for an eye." Cain spoke plainly to Henry, though Henry could not see the eyes that were behind the thick dark goggles he would get an unsettling feeling about Cain. Like he were an animal prowling.
Cain looked down further when he heard a second voice: "Sir,shouldn't we let him past" . When Henry had shrugged her off commenting "Shut the hell up I'm trying to figure out who he's working for so we can maybe get some work and not starve to death" It was all Cain needed to intercede.
"Ah, family. Such a lost artifact in these desperate times," He said, his blank facade staring right at Madaline herself. "You had best keep an eye on her, lest raiders get her. Then she'll be split from ass to crotch and begging for death long before it over. That is, if she doesn't learn to enjoy it first--some of them girls, they lose more than their souls. They lose their minds and begin to think its just another way of life." Cain spoke callously, but truthfully.
They were cut off by a shout, a crowd had formed and the local sheriff and the deputy had come to arrest Cain for his deeds. But they would all soon find out there was no resistance, just a cold calculating man with a terrible penchant for violence. There was a cocking of hammers as the two me--one young and one old. One tried and true and one just tried. The younger man in his eagerness got to Cain first, unknowing of what the man could really do. He thought he was safe with a loaded weapon. He was sorely mistaken.
The deputy ran up to Cain, holding his gun recklessly out and away from his own center of gravity. He mine as well have handed Cain the gun. He waited for the older man to get to him before he too pointed his handgun at Cain.
"Cain, we're here to arrest you." The sheriff said, heaving.
"Arrest me, my my whatever for?" Cain's covered face looked over at Henry--Henry could tell there was a smile somewhere behind the mask.
" Now you know what for, killing those two men the men outside the gates!" The sheriff continued to play the part of the fool.
" Oh, those men. Yes well, they shouldn't have trespassed on me. See, they drew their weapons on me. I didn't like that. Just like you are now." Cain retorted, the tone of his voice noticeably changing, slowly metamorphosing into something sinister.
"You were carrying a damn head!" The sheriff yelled out.
"Oh, that little thing?" Just warning to a company I worked for--I don't care much for babysitting. Out there its survival of the fittest, if you can't keep up--you die. You're no good to me dead, least he was good enough to give me a snack." Cain said slyly, much to the appalled crowd.
This had gotten the sheriff upset enough to lift his arm and slowly bring it d own to straighten it out leaving only the barrel mere inches from Cain's face. Like a viper he would strike. Cain lurched forwards, and the man went to shoot. Time stood still, but there was no bang. Cain had cleverly caught the six-shooter revolver in-between the hammer and the primer. The thick padding of his gloves kept his fingers from being crushed. His other hand had caught the man's wrist. Without hesitating, Cain made him blast the deputy in the leg by pulling his glove fro between the hammer and the primer which dropped the kid to the ground immediately screaming and writhing. He was no gung-ho shooter. Fresh tears welling in his eyes. Cain the turned the gun on the sheriff himself--speaking in contemptuous tones.
"Everyone is a sinner sheriff...Even you."Cain squeezed the hand of the sheriff's gun hand forcing him to fire off a round into his own shoulder. The sheriff would gasp as the wound was not fatal but punishing in terms of pain. Cain turned to the side, pinning the sheriff up against the wall. With his gloves one, Cain penetrated the bullet hole finding the tendon which drew on the man tendons in the mans arm and hand. Cain stabilized the gun with his other hand. He then remotely controlled the man's arm with just his fingers.
"Which sinner should we send to hell first sheriff?" Cain questioned, bringing the barrel to a woman. "The prostitute who gives her body away for pittance?"
Cain redirected the barrel to a man. " The gambler who throws it all away for greedy schemes?"
Cain switched again, this time to an actual shady looking fellow. "The crimelord whose money you've been taking in bribes and favors?" Cain then made the barrel of the gun slowly shift, redirecting it and placing it under the man's jaw, along the fleshy part just between the V-shape of his thick fatty throat. The man was blubbering.
"I'm, I'm, I'm sorry..." The sheriff sobbed both from pain and fear. It was evident on the man's face. Cain had a w ay of seeing past people's facades, of knowing their darkest secrets just by watching them, listening to them; the way they talked, the way they breathed and the way their felt beating inside.
"You should be." A loud 'crack' and the sheriffs brains were cemented all over the wall of the shop. He let the man's lifeless body tumble down the steps and roll out at the bottom. He then turned to Henry, and withdrew something wrapped in old newspapers. It smelled putrid. He placed it in Henry's hand and immediately, he would know what it was--a human hand. "Beggars can't be choosers, right?" Cain would remark about Henry's being hungry but that was only the half of it.
Despite being a ruthless son of a bitch, he never once showed a hint of conceit or condescension. He didn't even hold that "I'm better than you" feel about him, but his presence--his words spoke for themselves and in milestones. This was about Henry's complacency with Cain. This could be further elaborated on by the fact that as he passed Madaline, he slid her the currency to the town--to any town really. A golden nugget. Cain Simply stepped past the two, sauntering towards the helpless boy. He stopped.
"I'm going to give you a choice that will affect you for the rest of your life.You can either give me your hand, or give me your life." Cain said coldly, His hand had taken a hold of something, and it wasn't a gun. It was a tomahawk, slipped from the webbing of his armor's MOLLE system. The boy held one hand up as to defend himself.
"I'm sorry mister, I'm sorry!" He cried, he sobbed.
"It's too bad apologies don't reconcile tribulation. Only blood can save you now." Cain replied.
The boys face twisted in agony, as he laid his head down flush with the ground and slid his right hand outwards slowly, timidly. Sprawling his fingers out, he relished the last time he would feel with that hand again. A boot slowly pressed down on the back of the palm. The blow came so swiftly--even the boy who had his eyes closed and was waiting for it--could not feel it. Once he opened his eyes he stared at a bloody stump of what used to be a hand and wrist. The axe had cut cleanly through the flesh and bone. Cain held the boys hand in his free hand. It took a minute fore the sever pain to kick in--with adrenaline pumping rampant through his body.
"Oh," Cain turned back to Henry. "If you think you can keep up, I'm going out on a mission. Just keep in mind--I go where no man dares tread." He told Henry firmly, before taking the hand. The boy had begun to scream even wilder now. "Get this boy straightened up, don't need him bleeding to death." Cain said simply, walking on.
Madeline swallowed hard when he handed her the gold nugget, her father stood there half smirking at the scene. Her father looked down at the rotting hand that had been given to him. "Come on we're following him" he said as he set the hand down by the kid that had just lost his in the mayhem.
Madeline blinked "What... you've got to be kidding me" she muttered.
"Did I stutter soldier" said Henry as he tightened the straps on his back pack and began to follow behind Cain.
"No sir but... he's..." she didn't want to continue saying what was on her mind out of fear for her own life.
"He's exactly what he needs to be a survivor, and it's people like him that could help keep you alive... I'm not gonna be around forever Maddie and I don't want you to have the same fate as that poor girl in town. You got to learn to forget all the little pleasantries that you were taught before all this shit happened cause none of that is going to keep you alive" he said solemnly.
She was surprised her father had never spoke like this before "Sir, I don't understand, you would have me learn from a soulless monster how to survive. Whats to stop him from doing exactly like the people that tortured that other girl. Your heard what he said..."
"You know why dammit... cause your smarter then that girl you already know how to handle yourself. You just need to learn how to tune all this sentiment out and stay alive! Now shut up pick up the pace something tells me we're gonna be going pretty far before we stop with that he turned and concentrated on the path ahead of him.
Madeline shook her head this was a bad idea, a very bad idea but what other choice did she have. If she stayed in town she'd end up like that girl with the burn but following this man named Cain, felt as though it were a trip to the gallows. So it was die for real die inside, or a little of both either way she didn't want to be left by her father so she would follow...
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It felt like they had been traveling for hours, yet her father continued to follow Cain and she followed her father. "Does he even sleep" she said with exhaustion in her voice. She felt like she was about to fall over, yet her father didn't say a word about stopping for the night.
"Quit your bitching and keep moving" said Henry.
She gave him a glare that was full of detest, something he rarely saw "Well if your not going to say something I am, if he kills me so be it but I'm not gonna live much longer if I go non stop with no rest. And you especially, your already breathing heavy I don't need you passing out" she pushed past her father. Cain was a ways away from them so she had to jog a bit to catch up with him. "Hey, Cain I don't know what the hell you are but we're just human so we have to stop for the night that was our plan when we came across the disaster you created in the settlement..."
She was abruptly stopped by a yank on her ponytail "Shut up dammit, just keep your ass moving and don't think about how tired you are. If we stop and he doesn't we're doomed out here. So we're better off going to wherever he is and then passing out there got it" growled Henry.
Madeline rubbed the back of her head the pain still lingering where her hair had been pulled "Dad this is insane and you know it"
"That an order dammit!" yelled Henry.
"I'm not a soldier, Im your daughter God Dammit!" Madeline yelled.
Madeline blinked "What... you've got to be kidding me" she muttered.
"Did I stutter soldier" said Henry as he tightened the straps on his back pack and began to follow behind Cain.
"No sir but... he's..." she didn't want to continue saying what was on her mind out of fear for her own life.
"He's exactly what he needs to be a survivor, and it's people like him that could help keep you alive... I'm not gonna be around forever Maddie and I don't want you to have the same fate as that poor girl in town. You got to learn to forget all the little pleasantries that you were taught before all this shit happened cause none of that is going to keep you alive" he said solemnly.
She was surprised her father had never spoke like this before "Sir, I don't understand, you would have me learn from a soulless monster how to survive. Whats to stop him from doing exactly like the people that tortured that other girl. Your heard what he said..."
"You know why dammit... cause your smarter then that girl you already know how to handle yourself. You just need to learn how to tune all this sentiment out and stay alive! Now shut up pick up the pace something tells me we're gonna be going pretty far before we stop with that he turned and concentrated on the path ahead of him.
Madeline shook her head this was a bad idea, a very bad idea but what other choice did she have. If she stayed in town she'd end up like that girl with the burn but following this man named Cain, felt as though it were a trip to the gallows. So it was die for real die inside, or a little of both either way she didn't want to be left by her father so she would follow...
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
It felt like they had been traveling for hours, yet her father continued to follow Cain and she followed her father. "Does he even sleep" she said with exhaustion in her voice. She felt like she was about to fall over, yet her father didn't say a word about stopping for the night.
"Quit your bitching and keep moving" said Henry.
She gave him a glare that was full of detest, something he rarely saw "Well if your not going to say something I am, if he kills me so be it but I'm not gonna live much longer if I go non stop with no rest. And you especially, your already breathing heavy I don't need you passing out" she pushed past her father. Cain was a ways away from them so she had to jog a bit to catch up with him. "Hey, Cain I don't know what the hell you are but we're just human so we have to stop for the night that was our plan when we came across the disaster you created in the settlement..."
She was abruptly stopped by a yank on her ponytail "Shut up dammit, just keep your ass moving and don't think about how tired you are. If we stop and he doesn't we're doomed out here. So we're better off going to wherever he is and then passing out there got it" growled Henry.
Madeline rubbed the back of her head the pain still lingering where her hair had been pulled "Dad this is insane and you know it"
"That an order dammit!" yelled Henry.
"I'm not a soldier, Im your daughter God Dammit!" Madeline yelled.
Ryan had been zoned out until he heard commotion in the distance. It was faint, but as he turned towards the quiet noises, he could tell there was a little settlement not that far away from his barren wasteland position. He squinted to see, but his eyes weren't the best due to the conditions, and all he could make out were fuzzy building like structures. He kept his eyes trained on the settlement and jumped into his jeep, curious as to what kind of place it would be. At this time and point, he would benefit from heading into a local town, simply for the fact that he may get a lead on his target, whom he scanned in his mind to remember.
The person he was after was male, extremely so. The guy looked like a horrible humanoid monstrosity, standing at least 7 feet tall and being completely jacked out of his mind. The best question was how the hell this guy could hide with his large stature. What made him interesting - and the real reason Ryan cared about this bounty - was that the guy apparently had secret propane reserves on him, as well as a treasury of stolen goods. Ryan started the jeep as Argo jumped in, with Pat slowly sauntering in his normal way. He drove slow towards the settlement, hoping not to scare the crap out of any people that were inside with his vehicle. When he got close, however, Ryan could tell that trouble was brewing inside. Dead guards by the looks of their armor laid on the outposts of the entrance, with very scared people cowering inside. Along with a young boy that looked like he recently lost his hand, there was a dead sheriff among other corpses as Ryan walked inside the settlement.
Ryan tipped his hat, and the people cowered, especially that little boy. He gave them a raised eyebrow, and reached into one of his pockets, grabbing a roll of cloth and handed it to the kid to rap that stump with to stop the blood flow. "What happened here?" He said simply and quietly, hoping not to scare off the locals. He needed information from them, not their own problems onto his lap. The lady simply pointed in the direction where he could barely make out 3 silhouettes in the slowly darkening sky. He cocked his head slightly, confused with the turn of events, and then addressed the lady again. "Miss, I am looking for a certain man by the name of Marcus Kidman. Brute of a man, 7 feet tall, ugly face, that sort of thing." He reached into another pocket and withdrew the poster of the man's face and showed it to her.
At first, the lady simply stared at him with an incredulous look, as if she was questioning whether or not this was even important. It wasn't until Ryan gave a sigh and pulled out a coin when she began to speak in a rough language. "Went the same way as that psycho, he did." She snatched the coin from his hand, and he tipped his hat to her. He was slightly annoyed by her harsh and rude tone, but he ignored it and walked towards the exit when she called out to him as the dark settled in. "Kill that bastard, will ya?" Ryan turned and gave her a puzzled look. "That one over yonder, the bitch who shot our sheriff." Ryan turned away from her, making no promises and walked back to his jeep. He wasn't hired to do the job, so he really had no reason to go after the man. After all, it was a harsh world.
Ryan started his jeep and began to drive in the direction of that 'psycho' as the lady put it, hoping that they would just ignore him as he got close. He really didn't need anything happening while on the job that would cause him to lose either his temper or the welfare of his ride.
The person he was after was male, extremely so. The guy looked like a horrible humanoid monstrosity, standing at least 7 feet tall and being completely jacked out of his mind. The best question was how the hell this guy could hide with his large stature. What made him interesting - and the real reason Ryan cared about this bounty - was that the guy apparently had secret propane reserves on him, as well as a treasury of stolen goods. Ryan started the jeep as Argo jumped in, with Pat slowly sauntering in his normal way. He drove slow towards the settlement, hoping not to scare the crap out of any people that were inside with his vehicle. When he got close, however, Ryan could tell that trouble was brewing inside. Dead guards by the looks of their armor laid on the outposts of the entrance, with very scared people cowering inside. Along with a young boy that looked like he recently lost his hand, there was a dead sheriff among other corpses as Ryan walked inside the settlement.
Ryan tipped his hat, and the people cowered, especially that little boy. He gave them a raised eyebrow, and reached into one of his pockets, grabbing a roll of cloth and handed it to the kid to rap that stump with to stop the blood flow. "What happened here?" He said simply and quietly, hoping not to scare off the locals. He needed information from them, not their own problems onto his lap. The lady simply pointed in the direction where he could barely make out 3 silhouettes in the slowly darkening sky. He cocked his head slightly, confused with the turn of events, and then addressed the lady again. "Miss, I am looking for a certain man by the name of Marcus Kidman. Brute of a man, 7 feet tall, ugly face, that sort of thing." He reached into another pocket and withdrew the poster of the man's face and showed it to her.
At first, the lady simply stared at him with an incredulous look, as if she was questioning whether or not this was even important. It wasn't until Ryan gave a sigh and pulled out a coin when she began to speak in a rough language. "Went the same way as that psycho, he did." She snatched the coin from his hand, and he tipped his hat to her. He was slightly annoyed by her harsh and rude tone, but he ignored it and walked towards the exit when she called out to him as the dark settled in. "Kill that bastard, will ya?" Ryan turned and gave her a puzzled look. "That one over yonder, the bitch who shot our sheriff." Ryan turned away from her, making no promises and walked back to his jeep. He wasn't hired to do the job, so he really had no reason to go after the man. After all, it was a harsh world.
Ryan started his jeep and began to drive in the direction of that 'psycho' as the lady put it, hoping that they would just ignore him as he got close. He really didn't need anything happening while on the job that would cause him to lose either his temper or the welfare of his ride.
"Hey, Cain I don't know what the hell you are but we're just human so we have to stop for the night that was our plan when we came across the disaster you created in the settlement..." The nineteen year old girl had the balls to tell him how it was going to be. Just shortly before Cain stopped in his tracks, his masked visage turning around just as her father had withdrew her from his proximity. Either he was afraid of Cain, or he had learned to trust no one--in either case he'd be right.
"Shut up dammit, just keep your ass moving and don't think about how tired you are. If we stop and he doesn't we're doomed out here. So we're better off going to wherever he is and then passing out there got it" Henry tried to quiet his daughters fiery temperament.
"Dad this is insane and you know it" The girl attempted to placate her father.
In the end, neither really won this argument. The girl was just as stubborn as her father, the only real difference was--she had no idea where they really were. They had been trudging along through a dried up gorge for all they knew. Hell, they were probably used to having to fight people, not creatures that could paralyze you, or rip your arms off or completely gore you through Kevlar and ceramic plating. She had only seen the surface of this world; rapists and thieves at your back, while a murderer or two at your front. Humans were dangerous because they were so unpredictable, but they were not the apex predators anymore. They hardly were to begin with.
Lowering his XM8, Cain did something very unusual for Cain. In a moment that would extremely tense for any parent regardless of situation, he marched on past Madaline and Henry but as he did so--grabbed the girl by the back of her head and singlehandedly lifted her from the ground as he kept on walking, unhindered by her weight added to the heavier armor he wore strapped around him. He carried the girl to a tree, or what looked like one. It was a stalk of some kind seemingly growing out of the ground--there were many around them. The closer they got, the more putrid the smell.
Cain needless to say, was unaffected. He roughly planted the girl against one of the 'stalks'. There was a mucous like resin, it was a highly sticky substance akin to a jelly that simply would not come off the skin and left a feeling like there was something crawling on her. There wasn't--yet. Holding her there like bait, he slipped out his curved Kabar knife, it honestly looked like a chef's knife that curved twenty degrees at the tip. Despite any of her thrashing, she would be helpless in the end result. The stalk began opening up, splitting with a sickening sound like flesh being peeled from the bone. Much to her horror, Madaline would realize, the stalk was actually once a human being and that coming up from its gullet, into its throat and out through its mouth was what was called a 'Spiderling' They came from much larger species spliced between a human an arachnid.
Pulling her back slowly, he bated the spiderling out. It had eight legs--eight legs that were eerily reminiscent of the human hand and fingers. Its eyes were human-ish. While they were round and did hive an iris color like a humans they remained fixated. It had a bulbous abdomen with spinerets at the end. The spiderling launched itself with quick resolve, but throwing down Madaline his knife hand came up and impaled the creature which sounded almost like a human in agonizing pain. He twisted the knife before he knelt down in front of Madaline with the knife and the spiderling.
"Radiation...doesn't just go away you see...It bleeds into the ground, the water, the air. Why, you're mutating as we speak---one cell at a time. You think a starving human is bad--try letting your guard down with one of these in the area. See, the first thing they do is paralyze you, then, the suck out the pulp in your bones--you know, the bone marrow? With no bone marrow you can't create more cells to fight of the infection--oh and did I tell you how incredibly painful it is? Cause you'll be alive with the hatchlings start to eat you from the inside." Cain took the spider off and tossed it in her lap before standing.
"You're bitching and moaning about being human is fair game for the wild life that is in abundance here. I know of a place up ahead. Until then, we keep moving." Cain told Madaline gravely before his head turned swiftly to the direction they had come from. "Wait here." He commanded, he then took off sprinting--sprinting in two hundred and plus pounds of armor and equipment. He stuck close to the ridge of the river bed. His acute hearing picking up the sound of an engine running--it was not in great condition he might have added to the thought.
Cain crouched low to the ground when the vehicle had drawn near. His silhouette blinding in with that of a tree stump's. As the vehicle continued on, his gloved hands with careful measure grabbed a hold of the edge of the riverbed and scaled it very slowly. Once on top top of the bank, he was in a crouched position. He pulled back the the bolt on his XM8 and stood up, as he began walking--he opened. Some of the bullets ricocheted, but some also found their mark. The rear tires blew stalling the jeep. He let the AR fall as it was on a sling and in a second he had an 870 pump-action shotgun in his hands. He came around to the side of the car already on target. His shoulders were tightly compacted against the weapon and he was somewhat hunched.
"Why are you following me? Are you a bounty hunter?" Cain would inquire, though the man wouldn't see how solemn his face was due to the neoprene balaclava and thick goggles and the shemgh wrapped around his head beneath the helmet that he wore.
"Shut up dammit, just keep your ass moving and don't think about how tired you are. If we stop and he doesn't we're doomed out here. So we're better off going to wherever he is and then passing out there got it" Henry tried to quiet his daughters fiery temperament.
"Dad this is insane and you know it" The girl attempted to placate her father.
In the end, neither really won this argument. The girl was just as stubborn as her father, the only real difference was--she had no idea where they really were. They had been trudging along through a dried up gorge for all they knew. Hell, they were probably used to having to fight people, not creatures that could paralyze you, or rip your arms off or completely gore you through Kevlar and ceramic plating. She had only seen the surface of this world; rapists and thieves at your back, while a murderer or two at your front. Humans were dangerous because they were so unpredictable, but they were not the apex predators anymore. They hardly were to begin with.
Lowering his XM8, Cain did something very unusual for Cain. In a moment that would extremely tense for any parent regardless of situation, he marched on past Madaline and Henry but as he did so--grabbed the girl by the back of her head and singlehandedly lifted her from the ground as he kept on walking, unhindered by her weight added to the heavier armor he wore strapped around him. He carried the girl to a tree, or what looked like one. It was a stalk of some kind seemingly growing out of the ground--there were many around them. The closer they got, the more putrid the smell.
Cain needless to say, was unaffected. He roughly planted the girl against one of the 'stalks'. There was a mucous like resin, it was a highly sticky substance akin to a jelly that simply would not come off the skin and left a feeling like there was something crawling on her. There wasn't--yet. Holding her there like bait, he slipped out his curved Kabar knife, it honestly looked like a chef's knife that curved twenty degrees at the tip. Despite any of her thrashing, she would be helpless in the end result. The stalk began opening up, splitting with a sickening sound like flesh being peeled from the bone. Much to her horror, Madaline would realize, the stalk was actually once a human being and that coming up from its gullet, into its throat and out through its mouth was what was called a 'Spiderling' They came from much larger species spliced between a human an arachnid.
Pulling her back slowly, he bated the spiderling out. It had eight legs--eight legs that were eerily reminiscent of the human hand and fingers. Its eyes were human-ish. While they were round and did hive an iris color like a humans they remained fixated. It had a bulbous abdomen with spinerets at the end. The spiderling launched itself with quick resolve, but throwing down Madaline his knife hand came up and impaled the creature which sounded almost like a human in agonizing pain. He twisted the knife before he knelt down in front of Madaline with the knife and the spiderling.
"Radiation...doesn't just go away you see...It bleeds into the ground, the water, the air. Why, you're mutating as we speak---one cell at a time. You think a starving human is bad--try letting your guard down with one of these in the area. See, the first thing they do is paralyze you, then, the suck out the pulp in your bones--you know, the bone marrow? With no bone marrow you can't create more cells to fight of the infection--oh and did I tell you how incredibly painful it is? Cause you'll be alive with the hatchlings start to eat you from the inside." Cain took the spider off and tossed it in her lap before standing.
"You're bitching and moaning about being human is fair game for the wild life that is in abundance here. I know of a place up ahead. Until then, we keep moving." Cain told Madaline gravely before his head turned swiftly to the direction they had come from. "Wait here." He commanded, he then took off sprinting--sprinting in two hundred and plus pounds of armor and equipment. He stuck close to the ridge of the river bed. His acute hearing picking up the sound of an engine running--it was not in great condition he might have added to the thought.
Cain crouched low to the ground when the vehicle had drawn near. His silhouette blinding in with that of a tree stump's. As the vehicle continued on, his gloved hands with careful measure grabbed a hold of the edge of the riverbed and scaled it very slowly. Once on top top of the bank, he was in a crouched position. He pulled back the the bolt on his XM8 and stood up, as he began walking--he opened. Some of the bullets ricocheted, but some also found their mark. The rear tires blew stalling the jeep. He let the AR fall as it was on a sling and in a second he had an 870 pump-action shotgun in his hands. He came around to the side of the car already on target. His shoulders were tightly compacted against the weapon and he was somewhat hunched.
"Why are you following me? Are you a bounty hunter?" Cain would inquire, though the man wouldn't see how solemn his face was due to the neoprene balaclava and thick goggles and the shemgh wrapped around his head beneath the helmet that he wore.
Ryan raised an eyebrow when he saw the silhouette crouching, and then all he could hear was gun fire. Ryan quickly crouched behind his windshield, swearing only once and it was hidden amongst the gunfire. Argo barked before hiding, while Pat only slid underneath his seat in the most nonchalant way possible when somebody was trying to bury a little lead spike into your body. It was then that he felt the back tires of his jeep pop and he slowly skid to a stop. While Ryan was trying to kep his vehicle from spinning or doing anything hazardous, all he kept thinking was:
I just HAD to drive by a trigger happy moron. He gave a sigh when he finally came to a stop, only to hear the man continuous footsteps as he got closer to his vehicle. Ryan switched the gears of his mind into defensive mode, drawing faster than most people could blink and crouched down in front of the wheel. When the light adjusted, he was staring at a fully armored man with a very nice looking shotgun - even if he disliked how they maneuvered - pointed right at him. The man looked odd, but he certainly wasn't the sort of man he was looking for. The report for the unnamed target was that the guy wore nothing on his face or top because barely anything fit him. As the shotgun was pointed at him, Ryan instantly had his revolver pointed at it's holder. For a few seconds, it didn't seem like anybody was going to talk until he heard a voice from behind the balaclava which sounded quite civil actually.
Why are you following me? Are you a bounty hunter? Ryan raised an eyebrow, confused as to why it mattered what he was to this man. Seems like everybody has a bounty on their head. Ryan mused to himself, before lowering the turquoise bandanna over his mouth to talk more properly. He also took his goggles off of his eyes, letting them fall to his neck.
"Interesting question sir, coming from a man that just shot the tires out of a random driver." He never flinched, never showed any weakness in his speech, but also kept it as civil as he could. "I do happen to be a bounty hunter, but you are obviously not my target. I was informed that he was in this general direction by that village over yonder, one that I had heard that you had been to." Even though he felt like giving a little smile, he left that out. "I had originally been hoping to just be on my way, or ask if any of your party had seen my bounty, but now I am missing 2 tires..." He gave a little pause to asses the situation, slowly lowering his gun slightly and calming down his partners. "If you would be so kind as to lower your weapon, I can change my tires and be on my way and leave you and those two over there in peace."
The situation wasn't looking as promising as Ryan wanted it. He now had to change his back two tires - hopefully both of his spares were working - with a man who looked like he was expertly trained in combat and fire arms. His equipment gave him away easily as a man that shouldn't be screwed around with, especially with the weapons he was carrying. Not many could find a shotgun in that good of condition, or an assault rifle that actually worked well.
I just HAD to drive by a trigger happy moron. He gave a sigh when he finally came to a stop, only to hear the man continuous footsteps as he got closer to his vehicle. Ryan switched the gears of his mind into defensive mode, drawing faster than most people could blink and crouched down in front of the wheel. When the light adjusted, he was staring at a fully armored man with a very nice looking shotgun - even if he disliked how they maneuvered - pointed right at him. The man looked odd, but he certainly wasn't the sort of man he was looking for. The report for the unnamed target was that the guy wore nothing on his face or top because barely anything fit him. As the shotgun was pointed at him, Ryan instantly had his revolver pointed at it's holder. For a few seconds, it didn't seem like anybody was going to talk until he heard a voice from behind the balaclava which sounded quite civil actually.
Why are you following me? Are you a bounty hunter? Ryan raised an eyebrow, confused as to why it mattered what he was to this man. Seems like everybody has a bounty on their head. Ryan mused to himself, before lowering the turquoise bandanna over his mouth to talk more properly. He also took his goggles off of his eyes, letting them fall to his neck.
"Interesting question sir, coming from a man that just shot the tires out of a random driver." He never flinched, never showed any weakness in his speech, but also kept it as civil as he could. "I do happen to be a bounty hunter, but you are obviously not my target. I was informed that he was in this general direction by that village over yonder, one that I had heard that you had been to." Even though he felt like giving a little smile, he left that out. "I had originally been hoping to just be on my way, or ask if any of your party had seen my bounty, but now I am missing 2 tires..." He gave a little pause to asses the situation, slowly lowering his gun slightly and calming down his partners. "If you would be so kind as to lower your weapon, I can change my tires and be on my way and leave you and those two over there in peace."
The situation wasn't looking as promising as Ryan wanted it. He now had to change his back two tires - hopefully both of his spares were working - with a man who looked like he was expertly trained in combat and fire arms. His equipment gave him away easily as a man that shouldn't be screwed around with, especially with the weapons he was carrying. Not many could find a shotgun in that good of condition, or an assault rifle that actually worked well.
"Interesting question sir, coming from a man that just shot the tires out of a random driver." This driver seemed...peculiar to say the least. Although adept--having ceased the car from flipping or running off into the gorge itself he had also managed to draw his side arm a revolver-type. It was a Model 27 .357 Magnum that was highly detailed; etched surfaces and designs along the barrel and cylinder. His hand lifting made Cain tense slightly, you didn't get to be a predator by taking chances. His Model 870 was not your ordinary 'pump'. Attached to it was a fifteen round strap and on top of the gun itself was mounted an eight-shot yoke. The shells themselves would even seem...out of the ordinary. They were not the regular ol' buckshot or deer slugs. In fact, the on loaded in the barrel pointed at Ryan's head and chest area was indeed a sabot round shotgun shell; packed with thirty to forty tungsten carbide fletchettes. Small finned darts that could even pierce lower grade body armor.
Needless to say, at this range, it would really matter, nevertheless, one had to be prepared. The Tungsten Carbide used in the creation of these crude, almost seemingly cruel devices was three times stiffer than steel and was denser than either steel or titanium. Its hardness was comparable to corundum or sapphires on a hardness scale. However, as the man revealed his intent, to remove his bandanna, Cain gave a little slack but his finger was still hovering over the trigger.
"I do happen to be a bounty hunter, but you are obviously not my target. I was informed that he was in this general direction by that village over yonder, one that I had heard that you had been to." He knew immediately what shanty village he had just referred to. It was not in his habitual nature to remember towns, but seeing how he had just left it a few hours ago it was hard not to recall it. "I had originally been hoping to just be on my way, or ask if any of your party had seen my bounty, but now I am missing 2 tires..." He watched as the bounty hunter slowly lowered his weapon in submission and then signaling for his friend to lower his as well. Cain readily did not lower his. It was too much of a risk. However he did back off a few feet.
His nostrils had long since caught the smell of dog. He had nothing against them personally. Yet, as he was accustom to be a scavenger and hunting, foraging for things rather than simply buying them, he looked over at the dog. The canine companion, in lieu of a higher more dangerous predator, whimpered and lowered its ears from Cain just looking at him. The animals senses told it he was the dominant force naturally and it wanted nothing to do with Cain.
"You would be better off walking, loud noises stir things best left undisturbed" Cain's voice was astonishingly clear, and very grave in its tone. "Oh here, the currency is blood, nothing else will suffice." He told the two from behind the thick mask and black goggles. Yet, his carmine colored eyes stared out towards them, leaving them with a feeling that he was watching very carefully and it wasn't from fear. The reptilian slits that his pupils were, would shock an appall any number of folks. He was after all, the only hybrid mutant that anyone had ever heard about. Though they called him "Albino Man" few had ever seen his actual skin tone to confirm it. "Are you going to eat that dog?" Cain would inquire, his tone was suggestive that they actually eat the dog for a meal.
Needless to say, at this range, it would really matter, nevertheless, one had to be prepared. The Tungsten Carbide used in the creation of these crude, almost seemingly cruel devices was three times stiffer than steel and was denser than either steel or titanium. Its hardness was comparable to corundum or sapphires on a hardness scale. However, as the man revealed his intent, to remove his bandanna, Cain gave a little slack but his finger was still hovering over the trigger.
"I do happen to be a bounty hunter, but you are obviously not my target. I was informed that he was in this general direction by that village over yonder, one that I had heard that you had been to." He knew immediately what shanty village he had just referred to. It was not in his habitual nature to remember towns, but seeing how he had just left it a few hours ago it was hard not to recall it. "I had originally been hoping to just be on my way, or ask if any of your party had seen my bounty, but now I am missing 2 tires..." He watched as the bounty hunter slowly lowered his weapon in submission and then signaling for his friend to lower his as well. Cain readily did not lower his. It was too much of a risk. However he did back off a few feet.
His nostrils had long since caught the smell of dog. He had nothing against them personally. Yet, as he was accustom to be a scavenger and hunting, foraging for things rather than simply buying them, he looked over at the dog. The canine companion, in lieu of a higher more dangerous predator, whimpered and lowered its ears from Cain just looking at him. The animals senses told it he was the dominant force naturally and it wanted nothing to do with Cain.
"You would be better off walking, loud noises stir things best left undisturbed" Cain's voice was astonishingly clear, and very grave in its tone. "Oh here, the currency is blood, nothing else will suffice." He told the two from behind the thick mask and black goggles. Yet, his carmine colored eyes stared out towards them, leaving them with a feeling that he was watching very carefully and it wasn't from fear. The reptilian slits that his pupils were, would shock an appall any number of folks. He was after all, the only hybrid mutant that anyone had ever heard about. Though they called him "Albino Man" few had ever seen his actual skin tone to confirm it. "Are you going to eat that dog?" Cain would inquire, his tone was suggestive that they actually eat the dog for a meal.
Madeline sat there in shock after what Cain had done to her, the putrid smell from the spiders filled her nostrils and she almost felt the need to vomit. But she wasn't about to do it in front of Cain she wasn't going to act like he had scared. Of course she was scared to death but she didn't want to show weakness. She swallowed hard and looked down at the spider in her lap, standing up is slid down and landed in front of her. After a deep breath she crushed what was left of it under her boot, it made a cross between a crunch and squishing sound. She barely noticed the going on between Cain and the bounty hunter, it was like she had tunnel vision and her sight were set on one man.
"I told you should have kept your damn mouth shut. But no you had to be a big balls, bad ass and look where it got ya, your my daughter but I can't help you if your gonna be stupid. said Henry shaking his head.
Madeline grabbed her father by the shirt and spat in his face "You sorry son of a bitch, I'm your God damned daughter and you just sat there and laughed while that fucking maniac tossed me around like a rag doll. I've done nothing but respect you and save your sorry ass from getting mauled while your digging through piles of shit. Once we get to the next settlement Im done, if you want to follow him that fine by me but Im out" Madeline flung some of the slime off her arm and on the ground. And started walking in the direction the were heading before.
Henry wiped the spit off his face, and smirked "Thats more like it..." he said "You might want to wait for this pair or you may find yourself spider chow" Henry called after her.
Madeline stopped in her tracks.
"You know I'm right cause you have no fucking idea where your going, Cain's the only that knows where he's going" he laughed.
"I told you should have kept your damn mouth shut. But no you had to be a big balls, bad ass and look where it got ya, your my daughter but I can't help you if your gonna be stupid. said Henry shaking his head.
Madeline grabbed her father by the shirt and spat in his face "You sorry son of a bitch, I'm your God damned daughter and you just sat there and laughed while that fucking maniac tossed me around like a rag doll. I've done nothing but respect you and save your sorry ass from getting mauled while your digging through piles of shit. Once we get to the next settlement Im done, if you want to follow him that fine by me but Im out" Madeline flung some of the slime off her arm and on the ground. And started walking in the direction the were heading before.
Henry wiped the spit off his face, and smirked "Thats more like it..." he said "You might want to wait for this pair or you may find yourself spider chow" Henry called after her.
Madeline stopped in her tracks.
"You know I'm right cause you have no fucking idea where your going, Cain's the only that knows where he's going" he laughed.
Jack slowly looked up at the local sheriff.
"Thats it?" he asked, the small bag of currency and various objects on the table were meagre at best, an insult at worst. "Sorry son, but with the trouble round here this was all we could scavenge for you"
"I dont think you understand sheriff" replies Jack, slowly extending and retracting his combat blade from his armor, a nervous habit. "This isnt about whats on the table, but what isnt, i had a very exact price when you sent a runner all the way over to me" glancing down, Jack slowly retracts the blade for the last time, before standing up.
"There was meant to be a caravan leaving in a few days to Lactum, where trade was meant to grow and prosper, but now you are telling me that because i am not going with it, you wont send it?"
"I'm sorry Jack....."
"I dont want you fucking excuses sheriff, i want that caravan! I cant ride with it, that isnt my style, if you want me on it i do it my way, you hear me? You can pay your own guards on the way back"
"Now listen here..." stammerd the sheriff
"No you listen, you send that caravan, tomorrow, not in a few days, tomorrow, on it should be about half of your tradable goods, aswell as a mixture of mane, women and children, I will be providing long range protection and scouting from my buggy, which i expect to be fuelled free of charge, if you do not accept this offer sheriff then Lactum will be left behind"
Walking out he overheard some people talking nearby
"You here that Cain blew the head off some folks coupla miles from here?"
"Dont be stupid, Cain is a children's story, used to frighten children and train militia"
"No dude i'm serious, i've seen him"
"My ass you've seen him"
Jack smiles to himself, looks like this day wont be so bad after all
"So tell me about this Cain fellow"..........
"Thats it?" he asked, the small bag of currency and various objects on the table were meagre at best, an insult at worst. "Sorry son, but with the trouble round here this was all we could scavenge for you"
"I dont think you understand sheriff" replies Jack, slowly extending and retracting his combat blade from his armor, a nervous habit. "This isnt about whats on the table, but what isnt, i had a very exact price when you sent a runner all the way over to me" glancing down, Jack slowly retracts the blade for the last time, before standing up.
"There was meant to be a caravan leaving in a few days to Lactum, where trade was meant to grow and prosper, but now you are telling me that because i am not going with it, you wont send it?"
"I'm sorry Jack....."
"I dont want you fucking excuses sheriff, i want that caravan! I cant ride with it, that isnt my style, if you want me on it i do it my way, you hear me? You can pay your own guards on the way back"
"Now listen here..." stammerd the sheriff
"No you listen, you send that caravan, tomorrow, not in a few days, tomorrow, on it should be about half of your tradable goods, aswell as a mixture of mane, women and children, I will be providing long range protection and scouting from my buggy, which i expect to be fuelled free of charge, if you do not accept this offer sheriff then Lactum will be left behind"
Walking out he overheard some people talking nearby
"You here that Cain blew the head off some folks coupla miles from here?"
"Dont be stupid, Cain is a children's story, used to frighten children and train militia"
"No dude i'm serious, i've seen him"
"My ass you've seen him"
Jack smiles to himself, looks like this day wont be so bad after all
"So tell me about this Cain fellow"..........
Ryan raised an eyebrow when Argo whimpered at the man. Already Ryan could deduce a few things about this person, and none of them were very... normal. For starters, he was highly intimidating - although anybody could when they held a shotgun to your face - and very aggressive. Argo rarely whimpered, but when he did it was in the shadow of another predator, one that was usually extremely fierce and dangerous. The man had shot out his tires without any rhyme or reason, and the worst part? The man had the audacity to start lecturing him about the terrain.
You would be better off walking, loud noises stir things best left undisturbed Once again, Ryan raised an eyebrow. It was as if this man thought he was the only one that had been living in the wilderness for the past 5 years, scrambling through the barren wastelands and fighting off monstrosities. Yet even if that was what his words meant to Ryan, the tone the man gave off was just that of a man warning a fellow of the dangers around, with quite good clarity if Ryan could add. Oh here, the currency is blood, nothing else will suffice. Ryan couldn't stop himself, so he burst into a little laugh. The whole thing was simply amusing.
"Like the rest of this world isn't." The laughter stopped slowly, and Ryan jumped out of his jeep and began to walk to the back while Pat yawned. The cat really didn't care about the situation, for he knew he could simply just hide if anything felt like bothering him. Argo, who was a little too big to hide in cramped areas, was still scared of the masked man and Ryan rolled his eyes. " Let's be frank here mister: Currency doesn't exist anymore. Survival is the new currency, and how you achieve your survival is your business. However, mine usually requires a ride of some form, so this jeep here is one of my survival tactics, along with a few others." He began changing the tires with extreme speed when the most bizarre question he had ever heard came from the masked man's lips.
Are you going to eat that dog? Ryan stopped what he was doing, an incredulous look on his face, mixed in with a little shock. Ryan could never imagine eating Argo, that was just.. completely insane. I mean, this guy even sounds like he would! I... am at a loss for words. When Ryan finally got his train of thought collected, he shook his head and said to the man with that incredulous look still on his face. "Nope. Wouldn't dream of it. Argo's been with me ever since I was a kid, and he's really useful for tracking scents. Besides, " he paused, unsure if he should continue. "I rarely have to eat anything anymore. I guess you could consider that another survival tactic of mine. I believe the last time I ate was about a week ago..." He tried to see if he could think back that far, but his thoughts were interrupted by a man and a lady talking in the background. From the harshness of the man's voice, he could only speculate that he was in the army, and the lady was his daughter. He also picked up the masked man's name: Cain, or something like that. He turned to this Cain person and asked him his only question.
"So, since we are stopped, might I inquire where you would be off to with a man and what I am guessing is his daughter?" He said it loud enough that the two others could hear him as he finished up the first tire and moved onto the next.
You would be better off walking, loud noises stir things best left undisturbed Once again, Ryan raised an eyebrow. It was as if this man thought he was the only one that had been living in the wilderness for the past 5 years, scrambling through the barren wastelands and fighting off monstrosities. Yet even if that was what his words meant to Ryan, the tone the man gave off was just that of a man warning a fellow of the dangers around, with quite good clarity if Ryan could add. Oh here, the currency is blood, nothing else will suffice. Ryan couldn't stop himself, so he burst into a little laugh. The whole thing was simply amusing.
"Like the rest of this world isn't." The laughter stopped slowly, and Ryan jumped out of his jeep and began to walk to the back while Pat yawned. The cat really didn't care about the situation, for he knew he could simply just hide if anything felt like bothering him. Argo, who was a little too big to hide in cramped areas, was still scared of the masked man and Ryan rolled his eyes. " Let's be frank here mister: Currency doesn't exist anymore. Survival is the new currency, and how you achieve your survival is your business. However, mine usually requires a ride of some form, so this jeep here is one of my survival tactics, along with a few others." He began changing the tires with extreme speed when the most bizarre question he had ever heard came from the masked man's lips.
Are you going to eat that dog? Ryan stopped what he was doing, an incredulous look on his face, mixed in with a little shock. Ryan could never imagine eating Argo, that was just.. completely insane. I mean, this guy even sounds like he would! I... am at a loss for words. When Ryan finally got his train of thought collected, he shook his head and said to the man with that incredulous look still on his face. "Nope. Wouldn't dream of it. Argo's been with me ever since I was a kid, and he's really useful for tracking scents. Besides, " he paused, unsure if he should continue. "I rarely have to eat anything anymore. I guess you could consider that another survival tactic of mine. I believe the last time I ate was about a week ago..." He tried to see if he could think back that far, but his thoughts were interrupted by a man and a lady talking in the background. From the harshness of the man's voice, he could only speculate that he was in the army, and the lady was his daughter. He also picked up the masked man's name: Cain, or something like that. He turned to this Cain person and asked him his only question.
"So, since we are stopped, might I inquire where you would be off to with a man and what I am guessing is his daughter?" He said it loud enough that the two others could hear him as he finished up the first tire and moved onto the next.
"Like the rest of this world isn't." The man would laugh in his face. His complacency...bugged him. It made his eye twinge. He hated disrespect, rudeness. Yet, with his mask on, the man couldn't see his jaw, swiveling back and forth--grinding his human-enough looking teeth very tensely against one another. However, his leather glove betrayed his otherwise calm demeanor, groaning as it stretched. It stretched because his hand tightened around the pistol-grip of the 12 gauge pump. " Let's be frank here mister: Currency doesn't exist anymore. Survival is the new currency, and how you achieve your survival is your business. However, mine usually requires a ride of some form, so this jeep here is one of my survival tactics, along with a few others."
Drawing in a deep breath of air, his lungs inflated and chest pressed outwards before he exhausted the air supply and he gradually went back to his normal self. Calm. Keep yourself calm. He thought. There is no need to shoot him, you're certain one way or another he will learn what happens when you put a loud noise next to a hornets nest, right? Cain suddenly, and although it was hidden, smiled. Strangely enough, he lowered his shotgun. He even released it before he revealed his master plan--logic. " Tell me, as a fellow traveler--I am sure you are accustomed to various tribal 'pockets' of human activity, right?" His fingers loosely threaded with one another and although unarmed, he was not without the capacity to squeeze of the fletchette round.
"I'm sure they were very dangerous; killing one another for bullets, and food, and clothes--hounding you for the same I bet." His words were of course, all true as he had traveled the many islands and bits of continent left. Even the ones where radiation was highly lethal for any human to go. But he also seemed highly educated, very unlike the normal rabble of today's society where most couldn't even spell their names. "I'm sure it must have been very scary for you, to be shot at--had rocks thrown at you--maybe a fashioned stick or two?" He was now being his own form of condescending, the very worst kind. A truth filled kind. The kind that would speak volumes about a person.
"There is a margin that exists," Cain said to Ryan. Though rather than being flat out pompous with it--his voice was very sincere. " Between predator and between prey. One does not simply become a predator because he unts something else. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Oh no, that's not how it works. He slowly reached back, pulling out what looked to be a red bandanna. Hunting something simply makes you a hunter, it does not make you a predator. What makes you a predator, is simply--survival of the fittest." Cain stepped very calmly, perhaps unnervingly towards Ryan and while he was knelt down paying his attention to the tire exchange--laid the hand right in front of him. Whispering into the young man's ear. "Whatever I catch, I eat. Flesh is flesh. Human. Dog. Mutant. There are things here that are not out in those other places. You had best have a lot of guns when you attract the spiderlings...Or you're going to wish you had never had a dog once it gets bit by one."
He quickly tore off a finger, simply snapped the bones to such a degree that the shards severed whatever flesh, muscle and tendon was in the way. It was like he was simply chewing on jerky as he walked away. The crunch of bones sickeningly found their resonance from his mouth muffled but eerily loud enough to hear from the close proximity. He left the remainder there as he stepped away from Ryan, with his back turned to the man he headed for the gorge before he heard Ryan call out to him, and the others.
"So, since we are stopped, might I inquire where you would be off to with a man and what I am guessing is his daughter?"
"You might inquire, but then I again I might decline. You see, that man and his daughter have two things in common with being in my fellowship--one they aren't nosy, two they don't make a lot of sounds. At least, I hope I got through her head. The girl does still have some naivety in her, but she'll grow out of that in a hurry when her belly's empty. People tend to do a lot of things to survive that they wouldn't otherwise." Cain replied, before turned and jumped the twenty or so feet to the bottom of the river bed. His hyper dense muscles contracted upon impact, absorbing the recoil from it. He was only knelt one knew before he rose to both feet and carried on to Henry and Madaline.
"I'm afraid we might have a change of plans, this place will be crawling with spiderlings if he keeps that infernal machine running. We'll have to climb up the other side of the gorge and make a rather large outward sweep to get out of range of the vibrations that thing gives off. That is what they are attracted to. That webbing is everywhere, and wherever it is they can feel. But there has to be enough pressure to set the trap so to speak. I don't know about you two, but I want to well clear of them when they start to fester and roam."
Drawing in a deep breath of air, his lungs inflated and chest pressed outwards before he exhausted the air supply and he gradually went back to his normal self. Calm. Keep yourself calm. He thought. There is no need to shoot him, you're certain one way or another he will learn what happens when you put a loud noise next to a hornets nest, right? Cain suddenly, and although it was hidden, smiled. Strangely enough, he lowered his shotgun. He even released it before he revealed his master plan--logic. " Tell me, as a fellow traveler--I am sure you are accustomed to various tribal 'pockets' of human activity, right?" His fingers loosely threaded with one another and although unarmed, he was not without the capacity to squeeze of the fletchette round.
"I'm sure they were very dangerous; killing one another for bullets, and food, and clothes--hounding you for the same I bet." His words were of course, all true as he had traveled the many islands and bits of continent left. Even the ones where radiation was highly lethal for any human to go. But he also seemed highly educated, very unlike the normal rabble of today's society where most couldn't even spell their names. "I'm sure it must have been very scary for you, to be shot at--had rocks thrown at you--maybe a fashioned stick or two?" He was now being his own form of condescending, the very worst kind. A truth filled kind. The kind that would speak volumes about a person.
"There is a margin that exists," Cain said to Ryan. Though rather than being flat out pompous with it--his voice was very sincere. " Between predator and between prey. One does not simply become a predator because he unts something else. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Oh no, that's not how it works. He slowly reached back, pulling out what looked to be a red bandanna. Hunting something simply makes you a hunter, it does not make you a predator. What makes you a predator, is simply--survival of the fittest." Cain stepped very calmly, perhaps unnervingly towards Ryan and while he was knelt down paying his attention to the tire exchange--laid the hand right in front of him. Whispering into the young man's ear. "Whatever I catch, I eat. Flesh is flesh. Human. Dog. Mutant. There are things here that are not out in those other places. You had best have a lot of guns when you attract the spiderlings...Or you're going to wish you had never had a dog once it gets bit by one."
He quickly tore off a finger, simply snapped the bones to such a degree that the shards severed whatever flesh, muscle and tendon was in the way. It was like he was simply chewing on jerky as he walked away. The crunch of bones sickeningly found their resonance from his mouth muffled but eerily loud enough to hear from the close proximity. He left the remainder there as he stepped away from Ryan, with his back turned to the man he headed for the gorge before he heard Ryan call out to him, and the others.
"So, since we are stopped, might I inquire where you would be off to with a man and what I am guessing is his daughter?"
"You might inquire, but then I again I might decline. You see, that man and his daughter have two things in common with being in my fellowship--one they aren't nosy, two they don't make a lot of sounds. At least, I hope I got through her head. The girl does still have some naivety in her, but she'll grow out of that in a hurry when her belly's empty. People tend to do a lot of things to survive that they wouldn't otherwise." Cain replied, before turned and jumped the twenty or so feet to the bottom of the river bed. His hyper dense muscles contracted upon impact, absorbing the recoil from it. He was only knelt one knew before he rose to both feet and carried on to Henry and Madaline.
"I'm afraid we might have a change of plans, this place will be crawling with spiderlings if he keeps that infernal machine running. We'll have to climb up the other side of the gorge and make a rather large outward sweep to get out of range of the vibrations that thing gives off. That is what they are attracted to. That webbing is everywhere, and wherever it is they can feel. But there has to be enough pressure to set the trap so to speak. I don't know about you two, but I want to well clear of them when they start to fester and roam."
Madeline looked over at Cain with a look of detest, because her father had chosen to follow him they were in this situation.
"I'm afraid we might have a change of plans, this place will be crawling with spiderlings if he keeps that infernal machine running. We'll have to climb up the other side of the gorge and make a rather large outward sweep to get out of range of the vibrations that thing gives off. That is what they are attracted to. That webbing is everywhere, and wherever it is they can feel. But there has to be enough pressure to set the trap so to speak. I don't know about you two, but I want to well clear of them when they start to fester and roam." Cain said after leaving the man in the Jeep behind.
Madeline looked back at the other man, and then looked at Cain "So your just gonna leave him" she said.
A growl came from Henry "He was the one stupid enough to come barreling through here with that damn car let him be spider chow the idiot" he said as he trudged along behind the two younger people.
Madeline shook her head And continued following Cain in silence, she didn't want to ensue any kind of reaction from him before they got to wherever he was taking them. After the stunt he pulled with the spider before, she wondered if he wasn't just leading them so he could off them. Either way she was going to keep her eyes on him just in case she had to take matters into her own hands.
"I'm afraid we might have a change of plans, this place will be crawling with spiderlings if he keeps that infernal machine running. We'll have to climb up the other side of the gorge and make a rather large outward sweep to get out of range of the vibrations that thing gives off. That is what they are attracted to. That webbing is everywhere, and wherever it is they can feel. But there has to be enough pressure to set the trap so to speak. I don't know about you two, but I want to well clear of them when they start to fester and roam." Cain said after leaving the man in the Jeep behind.
Madeline looked back at the other man, and then looked at Cain "So your just gonna leave him" she said.
A growl came from Henry "He was the one stupid enough to come barreling through here with that damn car let him be spider chow the idiot" he said as he trudged along behind the two younger people.
Madeline shook her head And continued following Cain in silence, she didn't want to ensue any kind of reaction from him before they got to wherever he was taking them. After the stunt he pulled with the spider before, she wondered if he wasn't just leading them so he could off them. Either way she was going to keep her eyes on him just in case she had to take matters into her own hands.
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For two more hours they would trudge onward through thickets and brambles, with Cain's head lifted to the air sniffing like he were a common dog."Wait," He seized in place holding one hand up into a tightly compacted fist. " Okay, I can't smell those damn things anymore. We can make camp here." Cain said, setting the back back he was carrying along with his gear and his armor. Despite the bitter glances he received from the daughter, every time he would look back he could feel her prying eyes on him.
She scoured for something to make her father deviate from this mission. Yet, already he understood something in their dynamic. She was too naive yet to understand it--that sometimes when your starving and down, you'll do anything to protect the ones you love. Even crazy, insane things like trust a killer like he was. He was simply following an innate nature to protect his progeny. Had he some of his own, he too would do the same. There were no ifs ands ors buts. There was only absolutes. This world did not afford opportunity very much, when it did, you took the chances no matter what they were.
Within mere moments, Cain had a fire going from kindling, and old rags and bits of paper. He seemed very resourceful in his duty to survive. He then stood up but put his AR by the three nearby. He was very particular, he would notice if it had been touched. He then unsheathed his knife. "I'm going to hunt." Was all that he would say, his facce mask staring blatantly at Madeline. This was on purpose as he knew it would more than likely unnerve her, given all she's seen him do today.
She scoured for something to make her father deviate from this mission. Yet, already he understood something in their dynamic. She was too naive yet to understand it--that sometimes when your starving and down, you'll do anything to protect the ones you love. Even crazy, insane things like trust a killer like he was. He was simply following an innate nature to protect his progeny. Had he some of his own, he too would do the same. There were no ifs ands ors buts. There was only absolutes. This world did not afford opportunity very much, when it did, you took the chances no matter what they were.
Within mere moments, Cain had a fire going from kindling, and old rags and bits of paper. He seemed very resourceful in his duty to survive. He then stood up but put his AR by the three nearby. He was very particular, he would notice if it had been touched. He then unsheathed his knife. "I'm going to hunt." Was all that he would say, his facce mask staring blatantly at Madeline. This was on purpose as he knew it would more than likely unnerve her, given all she's seen him do today.
It was nice to finally sit down and Madeline still sat in silence as her father pulled out some food tossing it to her. She kept glancing over at Cain, what was it about him that made her father decide that this was a good idea. "Eat dammit I don't want to hear your bitching later" said Henry as he pulled the aluminum lid off of whatever he had decided to eat. Madeline looked down at her what her father had tossed in her lap, and soon began to eat it.
"I'm going to hunt." said Cain.
It kind of startled Madeline at first she hadn't heard him speak in a normal tone of voice. Yet she staid quiet and nodded acknowledging his statement, frankly she didn't want to know exactly what he ate. But she was in an odd way curious about him as well. So cold and cruel what could happen to him to make him this way. Yes the world was harsh, but was it truly a reason to loose your humanity, what makes you different from the monsters that try to kill you.
She went back to eating and hoped that he might give up on them and move on, she could convince her father to defer if that were to happen.
"I'm going to hunt." said Cain.
It kind of startled Madeline at first she hadn't heard him speak in a normal tone of voice. Yet she staid quiet and nodded acknowledging his statement, frankly she didn't want to know exactly what he ate. But she was in an odd way curious about him as well. So cold and cruel what could happen to him to make him this way. Yes the world was harsh, but was it truly a reason to loose your humanity, what makes you different from the monsters that try to kill you.
She went back to eating and hoped that he might give up on them and move on, she could convince her father to defer if that were to happen.
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He could hear the tin cans being 'popped' open, their contents safe from radiation, safe from disease. It was perfect for them. However, as a creature of...particular tastes, he would never mind the radiation levels. His skin seemed absorbent of radiation in general. It wasn't soon after Cain had disappeared into the veil of the unknown that he stripped the heavy two hundred and some odd pounds of ballistic armor which he rested on the branch of a tree. Which groaned at the task of holding such weight. He then took his boots, then his mask and helmet before finally taking off his gloves. All this would reveal a remarkable creation.
Stark white skin as though dyed by the moons basking light, his hair, long and silky in appearance shared his body's apparent lack of color. The only true color on him were his saurian eyes; deep carmine they were. His body appeared as smooth as cream, even with the scars that once labeled him a slave to humans. Yet his surprising eyes would not be the one and only feature that garnered fear. The tips of his fingers ended with curving talons rather than finger nails. Much like a bird of prey, these nails could very produce a gashing wound in the most primitive of ways. Yet he had filed them back a ways so not to interfere with using his hands.
Knife in hand once again, he knew very well what he was hunting. Poachers. Men that had come to collect the bounty on his head. He fled deeper into the woods, like jaguar that knew them well, drawing the encircling elite from closing in on Henry and Madaline.
Stark white skin as though dyed by the moons basking light, his hair, long and silky in appearance shared his body's apparent lack of color. The only true color on him were his saurian eyes; deep carmine they were. His body appeared as smooth as cream, even with the scars that once labeled him a slave to humans. Yet his surprising eyes would not be the one and only feature that garnered fear. The tips of his fingers ended with curving talons rather than finger nails. Much like a bird of prey, these nails could very produce a gashing wound in the most primitive of ways. Yet he had filed them back a ways so not to interfere with using his hands.
Knife in hand once again, he knew very well what he was hunting. Poachers. Men that had come to collect the bounty on his head. He fled deeper into the woods, like jaguar that knew them well, drawing the encircling elite from closing in on Henry and Madaline.
Madeline cold feel fatigue begging to catch up with her, and with her hunger stated for the moment it made it even harder to stay awake.
"I"ll take watch tonight you go ahead and get some rest" said Henry as he poked the fire to keep it burning. Madeline was surprised she typically took first watch cause her father was older. But she wasn't going to let his offer got to waste.
"Alright but if something happens wake me up" she said as she pulled out her nap sack from her pack. It was old and tattered, but slightly better then sleeping on the ground. She rolled it out on the ground not to far away from the fire and zipped herself in, it wasn't long before her eyes felt heavy and she was sound asleep.
Henry sat and watched as he daughter drifted off, he was tired too but he knew that Maddie was even more tired. He was hard on her cause he loved her and didn't want her to grow soft in this harsh world. He didn't want her to die before he did, and if she was going to survive without him she had to learn hard and fast. He knew he didn't have much more time, his lungs became weaker every day he cursed himself for be so dumb when he was young, but there wasn't much he could do about it now. How was he supposed to know that one day he would live in a post apocalyptic world with irradiated monsters, and zombie like creatures that could kill you in seconds if given half a chance. The last thing he wanted was to die from cancer but... the point was moot now and it was closing in faster then he wanted it to. He poked the fire again and hoped that Cain was somewhere out there keeping and eye on the perimeter cause his eye site sucked.
"I"ll take watch tonight you go ahead and get some rest" said Henry as he poked the fire to keep it burning. Madeline was surprised she typically took first watch cause her father was older. But she wasn't going to let his offer got to waste.
"Alright but if something happens wake me up" she said as she pulled out her nap sack from her pack. It was old and tattered, but slightly better then sleeping on the ground. She rolled it out on the ground not to far away from the fire and zipped herself in, it wasn't long before her eyes felt heavy and she was sound asleep.
Henry sat and watched as he daughter drifted off, he was tired too but he knew that Maddie was even more tired. He was hard on her cause he loved her and didn't want her to grow soft in this harsh world. He didn't want her to die before he did, and if she was going to survive without him she had to learn hard and fast. He knew he didn't have much more time, his lungs became weaker every day he cursed himself for be so dumb when he was young, but there wasn't much he could do about it now. How was he supposed to know that one day he would live in a post apocalyptic world with irradiated monsters, and zombie like creatures that could kill you in seconds if given half a chance. The last thing he wanted was to die from cancer but... the point was moot now and it was closing in faster then he wanted it to. He poked the fire again and hoped that Cain was somewhere out there keeping and eye on the perimeter cause his eye site sucked.
Setting
0.00 INK
Away from the light of the fire he himself had made, Cain pulled apart his chest piece. The overlapping straps of Velcro hollered out as he stripped down. Hunting in battle plate was not a good idea. It slowed the wearer down, it made too much noise. He hung the ‘vest’ and the thick MARPAT designed coat that was digitally camouflaged. Next were his gloves. Thick leather gloves. Few knew the leather was actually tanned human skin that had been over lapped and ‘glued’ together using a resin from a spiderling’s entrails.
Once he had removed much of his clothing, Cain appeared much more…human. That said, his flesh was unnaturally white. It seemed to absorb the milky glow of the moon, yet at closer inspection, it had no true pigment, in fact one could say his skin was almost translucent. But that did little to hide the scars from years of abuse at the hands of slavers and humans that didn’t like abominations like he was. He had seen the worst parts of men and women- of human beings in general.
His hand slithered down to his boot where he unlatched a most dangerous device; a black carbon steel blade with a twenty degree grade curve to the tip. The already lethally sharp combat knife was now capable of cutting through ‘tough things’. He lifted the blade to hi face which was also now revealed. His saurian eyes; so well suited for hunting his homo sapient kin that it could see through the dark like twin lanterns. Indeed, his eyes would glow like a cat’ glint when he looked back at the camp.
He was hunting the most dangerous prey: Man. He could small them encircling the camp. He could hear their ever slow foot fall. Bounty hunters. He listened to their heart beats. Every one of them, Henry and Madaline included. Henry’s was labored. Raspy. His breath was ‘clogged’. Madaline’s stood out…it was flighty…free as a bird.
How very curious…
He twisted his neck like a serpent coiling for the strike before his body hunched forwards and he crept off into the dark. It wasn’t long before he came upon the first of three men. Their hearts, all of them beat steadily in his ears. The man held his automatic weapon like a crucifix; close to his heart and held out so he could believe it was there to protect him. Cain slipped by the side of him, his movements light, untraceable but the man’s human instincts told him something was very wrong.
Still, he didn’t listen and continued towards the camp. Towards the fire. The human eye could easily be deceived. If it looked into light at night, especially a bright one like fire it could only see ‘spots’ afterwards as it was trying to adjust to the light while being in the dark. This was when pounced. Dashing out, knife in hand, he swooped low and caught the heel of the man’s leg. The knife performed admirably; severing the tendon attached to the knee joint and dropping the man on the spot.
A loud scream echoed through the otherwise empty forest. The man clutched his leg. In too much pain to realize just what had happened. The second bounty hunter rushed over, and knelt. Seeing the large gaping wound on his friend’s leg, he grew very concerned. In standing up a silhouette emerged from the ground. Lifting slowly.
It was human in shape. Limber. Lean.
“Look ou-“ The first bounty hunter went to say, but even words could not flow from his mouth fast enough to match the fluidity and swiftness of Cain’s bare hand. The talons attached to the fingers where the fingernails should have been, were wickedly sharp. Even in comparison to the combat knife. They had perforated the soft tissues of flesh, tore past the fibrous musculature that formed a man’s throat and dug in in behind the guy’s larynx; the cartilaginous box-shaped part of the respiratory tract between the level of the root of the tongue and the top of the trachea. In humans and some other air-breathing vertebrates it is the organ of voice production, containing the vocal cords.
The man of course gagged in reflex before Cain viciously tore the noisy vibrating instrument out leaving a gaping hole. The bounty hunter clutched his throat and collapsed. He would die in mere minutes from exsanguination. The blood drew his blood to a palpable frenzy. It would be like an instant rush of a drug and as he drew his bloody fingers over his lips idly, he would momentarily lose himself in the moment before he was pulled back by the man he had left maimed.
“What the fuck are you?!” He would shout, trying to unholster the side arm from the dead body now lying over top of him. Cain growled, he didn’t enjoy his ‘high’ being affected this way. He quickly stepped over and lodged the knife in the shoulder joint, driving it so hard it pierced the bone and pinned it still. The man undoubtedly screamed bloody murder.
Cain stood up and simply walked away. But it was a ruse. It was an old trick. Wound one and let his friends come and turn one into multiples. The third man finally rushed over stopping in his track as the first hinted that Cain may yet be in the area. The man cocked his rifle and proceeded slowly. The air was tense and unsettlingly calm. His breath could be seen visible on the crisp edge of the night air. He scoured the trees, the ground. He didn’t spot anything out of the ordinary…
Suddenly, something rather large and very heavy struck the back of the man’s head knocking him to his hands and knees. Dazed, confused—his world was spinning and as he turned his head he saw first-hand Cain swinging a partially fallen tree with his bare hands. The strength with which would require any normal human was beyond imagining. Yet for the hyper condensed muscle fibers bulging with strenuous effort—as he swung like a major league baseball hitter and snapped the length of solid wood against the man’s face sending him spiraling out of control and crash landing several feet away.
Cain dropped the broken segment of wood and then grabbed the third man’s collar dragging him with ease like he was simply a duffel bag. Walking on, he grabbed the first man’s collar causing him to scream more because of the tug and pull on the knife buried in his shoulder socket. Cain drug the two men back to camp, exposing his every horrid detail to Madaline and Henry as well as the two that had been hunting them.
Once he had removed much of his clothing, Cain appeared much more…human. That said, his flesh was unnaturally white. It seemed to absorb the milky glow of the moon, yet at closer inspection, it had no true pigment, in fact one could say his skin was almost translucent. But that did little to hide the scars from years of abuse at the hands of slavers and humans that didn’t like abominations like he was. He had seen the worst parts of men and women- of human beings in general.
His hand slithered down to his boot where he unlatched a most dangerous device; a black carbon steel blade with a twenty degree grade curve to the tip. The already lethally sharp combat knife was now capable of cutting through ‘tough things’. He lifted the blade to hi face which was also now revealed. His saurian eyes; so well suited for hunting his homo sapient kin that it could see through the dark like twin lanterns. Indeed, his eyes would glow like a cat’ glint when he looked back at the camp.
He was hunting the most dangerous prey: Man. He could small them encircling the camp. He could hear their ever slow foot fall. Bounty hunters. He listened to their heart beats. Every one of them, Henry and Madaline included. Henry’s was labored. Raspy. His breath was ‘clogged’. Madaline’s stood out…it was flighty…free as a bird.
How very curious…
He twisted his neck like a serpent coiling for the strike before his body hunched forwards and he crept off into the dark. It wasn’t long before he came upon the first of three men. Their hearts, all of them beat steadily in his ears. The man held his automatic weapon like a crucifix; close to his heart and held out so he could believe it was there to protect him. Cain slipped by the side of him, his movements light, untraceable but the man’s human instincts told him something was very wrong.
Still, he didn’t listen and continued towards the camp. Towards the fire. The human eye could easily be deceived. If it looked into light at night, especially a bright one like fire it could only see ‘spots’ afterwards as it was trying to adjust to the light while being in the dark. This was when pounced. Dashing out, knife in hand, he swooped low and caught the heel of the man’s leg. The knife performed admirably; severing the tendon attached to the knee joint and dropping the man on the spot.
A loud scream echoed through the otherwise empty forest. The man clutched his leg. In too much pain to realize just what had happened. The second bounty hunter rushed over, and knelt. Seeing the large gaping wound on his friend’s leg, he grew very concerned. In standing up a silhouette emerged from the ground. Lifting slowly.
It was human in shape. Limber. Lean.
“Look ou-“ The first bounty hunter went to say, but even words could not flow from his mouth fast enough to match the fluidity and swiftness of Cain’s bare hand. The talons attached to the fingers where the fingernails should have been, were wickedly sharp. Even in comparison to the combat knife. They had perforated the soft tissues of flesh, tore past the fibrous musculature that formed a man’s throat and dug in in behind the guy’s larynx; the cartilaginous box-shaped part of the respiratory tract between the level of the root of the tongue and the top of the trachea. In humans and some other air-breathing vertebrates it is the organ of voice production, containing the vocal cords.
The man of course gagged in reflex before Cain viciously tore the noisy vibrating instrument out leaving a gaping hole. The bounty hunter clutched his throat and collapsed. He would die in mere minutes from exsanguination. The blood drew his blood to a palpable frenzy. It would be like an instant rush of a drug and as he drew his bloody fingers over his lips idly, he would momentarily lose himself in the moment before he was pulled back by the man he had left maimed.
“What the fuck are you?!” He would shout, trying to unholster the side arm from the dead body now lying over top of him. Cain growled, he didn’t enjoy his ‘high’ being affected this way. He quickly stepped over and lodged the knife in the shoulder joint, driving it so hard it pierced the bone and pinned it still. The man undoubtedly screamed bloody murder.
Cain stood up and simply walked away. But it was a ruse. It was an old trick. Wound one and let his friends come and turn one into multiples. The third man finally rushed over stopping in his track as the first hinted that Cain may yet be in the area. The man cocked his rifle and proceeded slowly. The air was tense and unsettlingly calm. His breath could be seen visible on the crisp edge of the night air. He scoured the trees, the ground. He didn’t spot anything out of the ordinary…
Suddenly, something rather large and very heavy struck the back of the man’s head knocking him to his hands and knees. Dazed, confused—his world was spinning and as he turned his head he saw first-hand Cain swinging a partially fallen tree with his bare hands. The strength with which would require any normal human was beyond imagining. Yet for the hyper condensed muscle fibers bulging with strenuous effort—as he swung like a major league baseball hitter and snapped the length of solid wood against the man’s face sending him spiraling out of control and crash landing several feet away.
Cain dropped the broken segment of wood and then grabbed the third man’s collar dragging him with ease like he was simply a duffel bag. Walking on, he grabbed the first man’s collar causing him to scream more because of the tug and pull on the knife buried in his shoulder socket. Cain drug the two men back to camp, exposing his every horrid detail to Madaline and Henry as well as the two that had been hunting them.
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Zackary Hannibal Kane
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"Dont worry i got this, or maybe not"
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Zackary Hannibal Kane
The only known Hybrid
Ryan Karengton
Target Acquired
Madeline Grable
"The world is just fucking nuts"
Jack Finn
"Dont worry i got this, or maybe not"
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Zackary Hannibal Kane
The only known Hybrid
Jack Finn
"Dont worry i got this, or maybe not"
Madeline Grable
"The world is just fucking nuts"
Ryan Karengton
Target Acquired
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World War III: Legacy to End Wars
1, 2by Seraph on Sat May 05, 2012 9:49 pm
- 20 Replies
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- Last post by Love of a Samurai
on Mon Jun 11, 2012 10:19 pm
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World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Most recent OOC posts in World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Are you still accepting characters? Please let me know if you are.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Sorry the post is so short I've had Bronchitis for about a week and am just now getting to the point where I can think again.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
As you guys had probably noticed, my posts have been few and far between recently. The Reason is actually because exams are coming up for me, and my teachers are starting to crack down on all the major projects they want due at the same time. I will be still in this, but I just wanted to explain the reason for my inactivity.
Should be able to post soon though, as there should be a break in my cramming soon :D
Should be able to post soon though, as there should be a break in my cramming soon :D
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Will post either today or tomorrow
Correction: Probably this afternoon..
Correction: Probably this afternoon..
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Wanted to know if you were ready for us to start posting yet, or would you like us to hold off.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
I hope that there is more detail, as this is my first character i hope i can add more as we progress?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Very interesting 'Spades.I have an interest in your character because of the similarities between Cain and Ryan.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Salutations JackOfSpades. The word "Bounty Hunter" is a relative term--at least here it is. It can be the salvage of lost technology (A lot of weapons were lost or thought destroyed.) Or it could be someone who's paid to go after another person--To either arrest or kill them. As for their relative placement in the timeline--look to the world today. Of course there were bounty hunters, even in war, before the war had begun, and after it concluded.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Hey Seraph, I was wondering if I could create a character to join?
Oh, and how does the bounty hunter thing work? I mean, were there bounty hunters before the war?
Oh, and how does the bounty hunter thing work? I mean, were there bounty hunters before the war?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Alright everyone, thank you for participating; W1LL1AM, could you be a bit more thorough with your bio, you don't need to go all kinds of crazy, but it should be detailed enough so that someone can really imagine him.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Submitted a character, fist time joineing, please inform me if i need to make changes :-)
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Okay I made a character I have no idea whether she's feasible or not but there she is. Let me know if she's alright or whether she sucks please, I'd really like to join.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
I have a question, when it comes to your female characters do they have to be at least 5'7 or can they be shorter then that?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
The character sheet is up. Its also bound to change as the roleplay progresses. Also, there is a lot of much needed information that details why this sets it apart from much of the other Rps.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Thanks for answering our questions, mate, but there be any chance of a character sheet?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Greetings and welcome. I have read many of your questions--and as of this moment I am creating--what I feel feel to be a sufficient character template. Bromander Shepard, your question about "lazer guns and kinetic shield tech" first. I feel, that even though the techno logical barrier has been breached in this timeline, I must also go with what is logical. In the same essence of why a "lightsaber" can not even be in theory, made of light nor a laser is due to the simple fact that that once that lasers, like light can not be stopped unless there were some in the way that absorbed or reflected it. It simply can not be wielded that way. I am going for technological breakthroughs that--today standards of equipment are the predecessors to. In other words, what you see today, what armament, vehicles, what have--in some cases-- been drastically altered to the point that today's tech could never compete with. As far as shielding tech, there is some what of a shielding tech for the Syndicate, I'll go over once I am more discreet and have a character template.
However, as far as the story goes, I am still unsure of rather to make it truly multifaceted by giving the players the choice of joining either Army. I've seen too many roleplays where, too many people have quit or lethargically stagnated the story because they have crippled in essence, a critically component. If there is enough support and well written posts, I might consider opening the Russians point of view but as it stand, majority will be on The Syndicate. Keep in mind, however, that even with these increasingly potent weapons that the Syndicate has, its still very much an up hill battle for them. If not for the description I gave for the Russian forces, then for the sheer fact that, The Confederation has swallowed up every country the world had signed over due to the oil crisis. That was a lot.
However, as far as the story goes, I am still unsure of rather to make it truly multifaceted by giving the players the choice of joining either Army. I've seen too many roleplays where, too many people have quit or lethargically stagnated the story because they have crippled in essence, a critically component. If there is enough support and well written posts, I might consider opening the Russians point of view but as it stand, majority will be on The Syndicate. Keep in mind, however, that even with these increasingly potent weapons that the Syndicate has, its still very much an up hill battle for them. If not for the description I gave for the Russian forces, then for the sheer fact that, The Confederation has swallowed up every country the world had signed over due to the oil crisis. That was a lot.
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Yeah this seems awesome, we'd deffinately need a character sheet and could you go into more detail about who we're rping as. I'm assuming soldiers and what the level of tech is for both sides? You mentioned that the Syndicate was more technologically advanced but how does that translate on the battlefield? Are we talking lazer guns and kinetic barrier shield tech?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
Aye, can we get a character sheet? And an idea on what sort of roles our characters will be playing?
Re: World War III: Legacy to End Wars
This looks really interesting, but how do you want the characters presented? Can I get a Character sheet?