The Night Before the Storm
The campfire crackles. You idly pluck a string on your old guitar. No one is speaking.
No one has to say anything. The Throne is out there. Everyone knows what's at stake. The fate of the wasteland is in your motley crews' hands. Melting shifts in his sleep. The poor bastard always is plagued by nightmares.
Then again, you all are. The wasteland's a tough place, and you saw its fiery genesis. You thought you'd seen everythig before that day. You'd dealt with theives, murderers, rapists. The scum of the earth, monsters in every sense of the word. Now, everyone you knew was a monster. Including you. Especially you.
Steroids turns the page of his book on theoretical physics, and a few hundred dollar bills fall out. He sighs, kicking the money over to Yung Venuz. The triangular alien snatches the money and continues counting the cash in front of him. You don't know why he bothers counting.
Across from you, Crystal sits, polishing herself. She looks up for a brief moment and gives you a smile. You don't smile back. She laughs, mutters about getting you yet, and then goes back to polishing herself.
Eyes sits across from Melting, all 20 or more eyes focused on the large maggot attempting to escape him. Every time it almost escapes, he pulls it back with his freaky psychic powers. You're glad Eyes is mute. You fear what he might say, had he the chance.
You don't look at Plant. He's chowing down on some carcass, and making a damn mess of it. He enjoys bloodshed the most out of all you, and he tends to carry corpses with him, making him permanently smell like death and entrails.
Robot is watching everyone with its cold, red eye. It's probably judging how useful each one of you is, choosing who to kill first when you reach the Throne. It notices your gaze, and shifts away from the campfire.
Near Robot, Chicken sits, watching some old cartoon reruns on a tv that's as old as you are. She made it a point that if the tv wasn't going on your quest, neither was she. Personally, you don't get why anyone would want to spend their time watching old cartoons, but Chicken's good with a sword and has the best throwing arm around. So you held your tongue and let the bird lady take the thing with her.
Rebel is watching the entrance to your camp closely. She knows bandits better than anyone else, and she claims that her old boss might catch up with and dismember all of you. So she watches, shivering a little under her huge scarf. Crystal invited her to come closer to the fire, where it was warmer, but Rebel refused.
Rogue made it a point to avoid all of you when she realized no one trusted her. When the I.D.P.D deserter first showed up, Crystal went into mama bear mode and nearly ripped Rogue's arms off. The only thing that's keeping Rogue alive is her knowledge of the portals, and the fact that she knows more about the Throne than anyone else. And Rebel. for some reason, Rebel defends Rogue any time Y.V. or Robot try to draw a gun on her. You decided to not pry into their exact relationship, but you can guess some of the details.
The most confusing member of your group is the living radiation known as Horror. It's sleeping, or doing whatever radiation monsters do to gain energy, in a curled-up position. You have a soft spot for it, but only because it reminds you of a dog you had when you were... 12? 11? You don't know. People weren't built to live past 100, and even your adult life is blurry sometimes.
The only sounds are the tv and the fire now. Y.V. has stopped counting his money for a moment. The moon, the same moon you watched when you were a young man, the same moon you saw the night after the nukes hit, looms above the wastes, slowly moving towards the horizon. You all have dreamed of being this close to the Throne, the last testament to a dead world, the hope of a new one.
You have a feeling it's going to be a long day.