The Wasteland

By: Gibson22

My elders had told me that this used to be a lush forest between gleaming cities.

I look at it now and see no remnant of its former glory. Instead, everything was scorched black as if the very dust itself was burned on that day. I lay in the backseat of a machine that had begun to show its age. It creaked and sputtered as it hovered through the wasteland a foot off the ground. Even though it was old, it was still very fast and I had to hold onto my helmet as we went past a dilapidated building that used to be hundreds of feet tall.

Going through the cities was the worst and most depressing part of these trips. Occasionally, thick rubble did well in covering up the skeletons of those who used to inhabit these cities, but every once in a while a strong gust of wind would reveal their fire bleached bones. Once I saw an entire family of skeletons huddled together as if they were hoping their love and their bonds would save them. There was an adult clutching a baby, but it appeared as if some debris from that day had crushed its skull. It was enough to make me cry.

"Janice! How is the cargo?"

I looked at the hunk of junk behind me. It was scattered into many pieces, wires sticking out left and right, some of them bare. The metal casing of a robot was rusted and full of holes, but it seemed the most important part of it was operational: the UGEE engine and the CFC units were in perfect condition. I simply sneered at it with disgust. I hated robots.

"The piece of shit is just fine."

"Watch your language around me."

We had gathered it earlier that day while scavenging through ruins. That was what we did every single day. We would board this crappy machine, ride off into some depressing ruin that served as a cemetery, find what we could and salvage it. However, my uncle was in a rare mood; A happy one that is. We had found a robot that was still functional. Sure, it was not functioning at the moment, but all it needed was to have its battery recharged and it would be back on its feet. Well, it actually needed feet first, but you get the idea. It was a fixer-upper, but far better then the things we usually find.

"Uncle? Did you say that all this changed when that monster came?"

He nodded grimly as he replied in the affirmative. It was not a pleasant conversation for him, because his father was in the army when it had happened. It was a common story in this era; a boy separated from his father, a mother separated from her daughter, whole families torn apart in violent explosions and flames. It was almost as if he had undergone a tragic war at a young age. He no longer seemed to have too much emotion in his heart, having gone through more pain than anyone could imagine. You would think that it would be worse for the children living in the aftermath, not having the chance to experience all that happiness that existed before it was taken away. I was one of the few who disagreed with that. For me, it is far worse to have and then have it taken away.

Whoever said, "It is better to have loved than to not love at all" should be brutally murdered.

My uncle loved his dad; he loved his family (who had died from fierce fevers) and his life before the coming of that demon. Now that it was all taken away from him, he really could not afford to love anything else. He was drained, a hollow husk that would only seem to carry out things mindlessly. It almost seemed as if his spirit had already left and his body operated on its own.

There was not another word spoken in between us. He only kept on driving while I removed my hat and held my AK-47 with both hands. It was a rarity when we were attacked by anything, but nowadays there is no better substitute for protection than a high-powered weapon of destruction. I was a vicious teenager, ready to blow anything into little bits. I found that being so aggressive kept me alive and wanting to make things better. I imagine if I were to turn out like my uncle I would die of sadness and boredom. I felt the slick metal and barrel brush up against the shin of my right leg and I felt extremely anxious to use it.

Usually, that meant only one thing…

Chills went down my spine as I heard some distant rattling. I strained my ears, and jerked my head in every direction to see where the sound came from. Without another word I pressed the butt of the gun into my shoulder, still keeping an eye out for anything that moved. My uncle did not look back, but he was able to tell that something had stirred my interest. "Use your binocular."

I obliged, reaching under my helmet and pulling down a single piece of circular glass that was attached to a hallow shaft. It was a really handy device, one that was developed before the day the world had come to an end. The gist of it was simple. It was a binocular that went over a single eye. It was no larger than an eyeglass, but it there was a small dial connected to the side. With a simple turn it would increase the magnification and the distance of sight. It was useful in spotting trouble before it found us and it was important in this very situation. It also kept my hands free but keeping a sight out at the same time.

I looked behind us and there was nothing there but large gusts of dust that flew into the sky from the wake of our vehicle. I looked to our surrounding sides and saw nothing else as well. Then I looked to the front…

"Oh shit!"

"I told you not to say that."

"We have sentries three hundred yards ahead, and they are blocking the way to the dome!"

Sentries were vicious robots that were more reminiscent to a type of spider. They had six, long metallic legs that had pointed ends. The legs were then connected to a bulbous head which housed demonic looking red eyes that only acted as visual receptors. They were about the size of the average human torso. I loathed them the same way others would loath scorpions. They would sting you with their legs; only instead of poison they would inject volts of electricity into your body until you went into cardiac arrest. They were fast as well, having been designed that way for use in combat ages past. It was almost like that demon that destroyed the world left the worst behind so that we would suffer in our poverty. A sentry was a bit of a problem, but facing twenty of them was a nightmare come true. Also, we could not simply skid to a stop and turn around. It would take only a few moments, but by then the horde would be upon us, tearing us to shreds with their pointed legs…

"Get up here then! Sweep them with as much fire as you can on my signal!"

I clambered over the back seat, sitting up front with my uncle. It was a little difficult because my uncle had suddenly accelerated and was rapidly gaining speed as we careened toward the small army of metal monsters. I was lucky to have not fallen backwards. Even still, I was poised in a battle position, waiting until we were close enough to fire. I was able to guess his method of getting past the creatures: we would charge them headfirst, hoping that the gunfire would scatter the majority of them.

I pulled the trigger with some effort and the barrel exploded into a cascade of burning metal. I was able to see the damage through my binocular and it had the desired effect. A few stray bullets had damaged some of their mobility, but they were still fast enough to dive out of the way of oncoming fire. I yelled in an effort to raise my spirits and aggression as I proceeded to empty out my entire clip. The tracers blazed in the air, and if I were paying attention to their path I could see the puffs of dirt or the sudden bursts of sparks when they made contact, but I was only shooting down the middle to clear a path.

We passed by the group of sentries, hitting a few and hearing their hard bodies clang on the heavily welded underbelly of the machine. The sentries were far from finished as I had expected. Their legs began to whirl loudly as the gears began to turn within them, allowing them to follow at an unbelievable speed. In the old days, these machines were used to take out high speed combat vehicles, so my crappy old piece of junk was only a crash course for them. I quickly jumped into the backseat, scrapping my shin against a piece of rusted metal. Still, I paid no mind as I quickly reached into a bag that contained clip after clip of bullets.

I was well trained by the old veterans that lived in the domes. Our lives were rough, and if you were to go outside you wouldn't last long unless you had some strength or skill on your side. Thankfully, I had both and I was more than happy to use them. My articulate fingers removed the clip with a press of the button and I reached for another cartridge, jamming it into the chamber.

The binocular had outlived its usefulness and I hastily pushed it back into my helmet. The enemy was very close to the rear of the hover car; close enough that if they timed it right they could leap onto the back. I did not take a headcount, but around five were about to make the jump. My eyes scanned for the nearest one, and there was a single sentry that was only a few feet from the rear.

"Take this!" I squeezed the trigger and more hot lead exploded into the metallic body of a single sentry. It began to lose speed, but it continued its pursuit. I switched my target momentarily until it would be a threat to me again. "You want some more, you little bitch? Bring it on!" Another started from the rear. "C'mon! You cold piece of shit!" The ground below them was a blur, but as their feet pounded against the surface I could see pebbles fly from the ground only to roll to a stop and become part of the blur once again. It was the same with my gun whenever I missed a shot.

I was screaming obscenities, but my uncle didn't seem to notice as we approached a highroad that lay in between crumbled buildings. He did not turn around but shouted out a warning that we were approaching the old town city limits. That was very bad news, because urban terrain was the most suitable for their purposes. Suddenly, the dirt road became rocky gravel that had broken in several places. "Sit down, Janice! We're going to do some evasive driving!"

I quickly obeyed and not a moment too soon. A large boulder from a fallen building obscured the path and my uncle jerked the wheel just in time. That did not slow down the sentry, who had used it as a sort of ramp. To my surprise he flew high into the air, landing with a thud on the back of the vehicle. I yelled as I unloaded on the monster at point blank, its legs curling and flailing like a dying spider. It managed to puncture the bodywork of the hover car and it still stands to me as a testament of what those deadly legs could do if they found human skin.

"Janice! They're weaving in between the buildings!"

That was what made them so deadly in an urban environment. In a field they cannot help but be seen, but in an area heavy with obstructions and distractions they could blend in perfectly. They were covered by the blurs of street lights, boulders and shattered cars. They zigzagged across the road only to go to the other side. I could not get a clear shot of them. "Janice! To your right!" I looked to the left of the vehicle to see a sentry flying towards me with its legs outstretched. I let out a scream of surprise as I hastily pointed the gun at his direction and fired. The force of the blasts sent him reeling in midair, only to land on the ground below, rolling and shattering his body on the street as it came to a stop.

I realized that I only had destroyed only two so far and there were more gaining on us. The rest of the crew had returned and they were zigzagging across the roads and buildings just as their comrades had done. Their red eyes clicked and whirled as they focused only on their targets. I cussed in frustration, reluctantly acknowledging that their mechanical eyes were far superior to mine. Then an idea flowed into my mind and I called myself an idiot when I realized I had forgotten it. I pulled down another binocular, but this one was different.

Another invention of war was available at my fingertips. There were many advances along the fields of different visions. As the world began to include machines into their mandate of battle, so had they included a way to easily spot them. It was a type of sight known as RES (Residual Electronic Sight). This type of binocular was able to pick up electronic pulses and signals, displaying it on the binocular as blue dots where the electricity was prevalent. The sentries' main point of weakness when it came to this device was the fact that the electricity was close to their mobility and CFC units. All the most important parts of the machine were in the head of the sentry.

I smiled in triumph as a group of scattered blue dots came into my view. The binocular could pick up the pulse, even if they ran behind debris that littered the sides of the streets. I was little frightened when I realized that some were a few stories above us, running by our side and capable of jumping on us at anytime. They had to go first. If they could experience surprise, I imagined they would have learned its true meaning as I pointed my gun towards them when they were previously unseen. Bullet shells spilled out of the chamber as I saw the effect on the machine through my RES.

I worked on the group that was still above us, glancing to the buildings and the street frequently. My strategy had changed and I focused on one sentry at a time. I could see them burst into a seizure of volts and flames out of my one eye while my other saw the blue dots disappear, occasionally bursting into a violent fit of dots as their electricity jolted out of their dented bodies.

Suddenly I screamed as a sentry rapidly fell towards us.

My uncle was very intuitive and he jerked his vehicle to the left. I fell back due to the sudden change in direction, hitting the bottom of my head on the side. I swore as I copiously rubbed where I had been hit. The sentry itself had missed the vehicle and tumbled onto the ground, spinning like a saw blade, its legs breaking from the speed. I felt my eyes drift as my world spun around. Then I felt a heavy hand slap the top of my helmet and a voice boomed out, "Stay with me Janice! We are almost in the clear!"

We were topside in this battle against the sentries. However, a few hundred yards ahead of us was an old tunnel. All machines were programmed to quickly analyze their probability of success in all situations, and in an enclosed space with no debris, a sentry stood no chance and would be nothing more than a sitting duck. My uncle grunted as he slammed his foot against the pedal, and the car slowed for a moment before it went into a violent burst of speed. The sentries had begun to speed up as well, quickly realizing how drastically low their chances of success would be if we made it to the tunnel. I was dizzy and that is not a condition you would want to be in if you had a gun. Nevertheless, I leaned against a seat with the shoulder that held the barrel of the AK-47. I tried my best to focus my eyes, but they seemed to roll lazily in my sockets. I pulled the trigger and a hot steam of lead bounced all over the area behind us as the sentries scattered from the aim. They were confused, not knowing that I was beginning to lose consciousness, and they were not certain whether or not I was capable of aiming.

"Stay awake, Janice!" My uncle shouted in a warning tone.

It was so hard and my vision was becoming hazy. My arms were beginning to seem heavy, and somewhere in my mind I told myself that my uncle could make the tunnel and that I did not need to worry. Yet, he continued to yell to keep me focused and I did so grudgingly. My shots were going nowhere, but it still confused the sentries who would occasionally receive a bullet or at least come close to being grazed. Suddenly it became dark as we entered the dimly light tunnel, but I thought it was my own eyes going dark which only encouraged me more to fall asleep.

And I obliged…

Author's Note: Um…I don't own the Chrono Trigger franchise. All characters excluding Robo are original creations.