Funny thing, here's yet another story I'll drop here and update in a year, lmao. *No shits given*
When was there a time of peace? When this shit storm so called World War Three had not happened. Who knows who fired off the first nukes? I'd never know since I was two when it happened.
What I do remember is my mother, who clutched onto me as the radioactive fallout had settled down. My father was shipped out to what I believe now to be Europe to fight, but some courses I found later stated that his ship was hit directly by some bomb of sorts. Couple months later, Mom died and I felt something changing inside me, like some sharp knife cutting into my small body. That's how got my freakish ability to regenerate at the cost of some of my humanity. My hair literally turned snow white, and my left eye glows a hue of red which is why I wear an eye patch. Literally now about 23 years later I could care less, I used to live local FEMA camps that have become something of the new cities in the North, ran by Feds who still tax the shit outta people who live there. I enlisted in the army with the Feds, but they told me I was good enough only to go round on border patrols with the New Congregation of the South, a.k.a the Confederacy part 2. Oddly enough, the South is now bustling with commerce as they're probably the first to eradicate the radiation from their major cities.
Been in several small regiments, but I've decided that living in some town near the Congregation suits me better. My name? I believe it was Klaus Hartmann originally, but I prefer White Death. Been through some hard shit, killed some bastards, maybe some civilians, but I don't swear allegiance to anyone. Literally a mercenary or as some call me, an ex-military specialist in the apocalyptic Continental United States.
"Echo 1, we've been getting some reports on bandits or Mercs in the area. Try ta keep an eye peeled would ya? This is some important cargo we're shipping down ta Charleston." The radio chatters.
"Now that's the sign I'm looking for." I say to no one in particular, loading a clip of 5.45x39 FMJ into my AN-94, a special gun that a dead pal gave to me three months back. The poor guy had his throat ripped out by mutated dogs.
I take a sip of canned coffee, a specialty these days.
I pull out an M37 Ithaca out from the back seat of my truck just as the convoy approaches. Looks like the usual four pickup trucks.
"When can I actually get a better convoy to raid…" I mutter, pressing the call buttons on the cellphone. I watch as my IEDs I had planted in the gravel blow into a beautiful orange fireball.
The first truck is sent flying.
Almost instantaneously I exit my vehicle, shooting into the windshields of the next vehicle.
"AMBUSH!" I hear a guy shout. See here's the thing. I know which truck actually has the loot in it, and that's the one that these guys usually heavily defend.
I raise my AN-94 and line up sights with another guy and squeeze off another four shots into his chest. He falls, but his finger had stayed on the trigger of the Kriss Vector, the submachine gun spraying into his buddy beside him.
A metal clank sounds besides me. I turn just in time to see the blinding flash and the ear piercing screech in my ears.
A flashbang… these guys must have hit some abandoned base somewhere… I thought to myself as I tug off my eye patch, exposing my glowing eye.
"Y'all fucked up now." I say as I tug off the M37, catching a guy's knife on the barrel. He mouths something I can't comprehend, either a scream of help or suprise.
"I CAN'T FUCKING HEAR YOU FROM THE RINGING IN MY FUCKING EARS." I shout back as I swing my right leg at his feet, knocking him over. His face gets a welcoming amount of pellets.
"Four down, I think two more maybe?" I say, pumping the shotgun. The ringing in my ears start to fade, and my right eye clears up.
"Alright cocksuckers, it's the only time I'll do this, come out with yer hands in the air and guns dropped or I'll take my sweet time and blow yer heads off." I state nice and clear, awaiting the reply. The sounds of two guns dropping catches my attention and I turn towards the sound. Seeing the two pairs of hands makes me smile.
"Come out, I promise I won't shoot ya." I say, watching the two walk out. One of them looks about his mid 30s while the other looks more like he's in his early 20s.
"Please dun shoot us sir, we jus doin our job as them convoy drivers in them Congregation." the younger one says.
"First things first, there anyone else I didn't account for?" I ask. The older one shakes his head.
"Jus us left man, ya massacred the rest of em." He States. "Names Jim Forrester by the way."
I scratch my head.
"So y'all don't mind if I take some of your shit right?" I ask.
"Ain't stopping you. You spare my life, I'll let you take some of this shit. Ain't like they pay us enough down in Charleston anyways. This is my 8th convoy and trust me, the mercs they hire down there ain't doin their jobs properly ya hear? They be gettin drunk an then when them bandits like you come along, we dun really have support." He States. "Ain't that right, Hunter."
The younger one nods silently.
I walk over to the last truck, ignoring the dead man lying in the puddle of blood besides it.
"You guys hit a military arsenal of some sort?"
I'm looking at a mysterious iron box, a Tac .50, and a couple of M4A1s and Mk 14 EBRs.
"I'll be taking this box and the Tac .50, I'll be nice and leave y'all the other guns."
Hunter gets up.
"You can't take that, sir we've been told to kee-" he stops as I hold the Ithaca to his forehead.
"I can either let you live or you can be like this guy." I warn him as I kick the corpse on the floor.
Hunter backs down.
"Thought so."
Jim puts his hand on Hunter's shoulder.
I pull out my wallet, taking out five one hundred dollar bills.
"This ain't every day that I do this, but I'd rather y'all know that I am human and not a monster." I wave them off.
"Now get the fuck out before I change my good damn mind." I shout.
Jim and Hunter rush to the vehicle, making a Zerg rush down the highway.
Now alone again, I take the time to look through the other three trucks to see what I could salvage.
First truck had about nothing, just two packs of cigarettes, couple boxes of .45 ammo for their Vectors, and a lighter.
Second truck had just about the same except a HK416 which I decided to take as I was going to head back to my cabin .
The flipped truck was a lost cause, there was rain that I noticed was going to fall any minute and knowing all the radiation in the air, I'd take my chances.
The drive back to my cabin wasn't that long, probably at most about a 30 minute drive back up north. The rain just started to come down and as my radometer tells me, it's radiation levels are in between bad and very bad.
I slowly take my new toys back into the cabin and put them in the storage room, except for the mysterious box. This said box somewhat intrigues me. There doesn't seem to be a lock on it, which really puzzles me.
I take a crowbar from the mantle of my fireplace and try to pry it open. The box doesn't budge at all. What I do notice is that there was a small gap that seems like it could fit a small keycard or some shit inside it. The only thing that I had that ever so resembles a card is my Military ID, which I still haven't bothered to get rid of.
"It'll be best just to fit the card inside then, not like I'm going to be using the card anymore anyways." I mutter, pulling the card out of my pocket and insert it in. That was when there was what seemed to be an explosion and the box blew open. Instinctively, I raised my M37 towards the box, the smoke still filling up the space around the box. The first thing that hit me was my ID card, which struck my forehead. The next thing that happened was that the smoke disappeared, but there was a girl sitting inside the box. I watch her get up and stretch, twisting her back side to side as she yawns.
By the looks of it I could tell she's German. As she turns her back towards me, I catch a glimpse of the words "Freiheit" printed in white letters on the back of her olive green jacket.
"Comman...der..?" She says, slowly turning around and faces me. She sees the shotgun pointed at her and she jumps back in fright.
"Y-y-you're c-commander Hartmann r-right?" She points at me asking. Her eyes, I take note, seem to have odd irises, strangely having stars in them.
I lower the M37.
"Yeah, who are you?" I ask.
"I am T-doll model UMP 40, n-nice to meet you, Commander Hartmann." She says giving me a salute.
I just stare as she salutes me, dumbfounded.
"U-ummm.. Commander?" She waves her hand in front of my face.
"Oh uhh...yeah, nice to meet you too…" I respond.
I watch her pick up her gun from the crate, which true to her name was an H&K UMP 40.
"I'm sorry...but what's a T-doll?" I ask. It sounds stupid, and she looks at me with a concerning look, but I have no idea what it is.
"T-doll means Tactical Dolls, we were built to serve as soldiers after the rise of terrorism around the world like the aftermath of 9/11 and the Paris Attacks back in 2015 Basically I'm an android." She explains to me.
"Well, you've probably been literally living under the box… it's a brand new world now in 2031, the world has nuked itself to oblivion in the so-called world war three." I say as I sit down on to a chair.
"W-world war three?" She gives off a sense of shock and horror.
"Happened when I was two… what I heard, Russia and the US declared war on each other, and both of them pressed the button at the same time. Other countries decided to join in and start firing nukes at each other until the atmosphere literally turned radioactive for a long period of time. Anarchy ensued, yatta yatta yatta, and here we are today, 24 years later, what used to be 8 billion people in the world has been reduced to 4 billion." I continue to give this lecture on the modern day world for at least another good 30 minutes.
By the end, she somehow got the grasp of the basics of what happened.
"Sorry for having my house so shabby… I'm usually not used to having people here…" I say, slowly getting up from the chair. I check my watch.
1728 hours.
"UMP, you want to go check out Wilmington? I have some business to do there anyways." I ask, walking into the storage room and taking some of the guns out.
"Town? Sure!" She says happy, her eyes seeming to shine as she follows.
I take out two .50 caliber snipers out of my storage, along with various different guns that I've taken from looters and abandoned posts a like. Why Wilmington you may ask. It's a city that wasn't really hit by nukes and The feds really didn't give a shit about that city. It's run by a man by the name of Maxwell Smith, a Liberal who was a successful business owner back before the Nukes, and one of the guys who is well respected around the area of the city, and the county he now owns.
"Commander, do you need help carrying some of that?" 40 asks, strolling at my side.
"I can handle it." I say, flipping open the hatch to the back of the truck and begin packing the guns in, placing more valuable guns into containers and ammunition into their respective boxes. I then turn towards 40, holding an AR-15.
"I know you probably were designed to shoot the UMP 40, but that's an SMG, which isn't that effective if we're doing distance battles…. It would be better if you could try learning how to use the AR-15." I say, handing her the rifle.
She gives a small blush as she takes the rifle.
"I-I'll do my best Commander!" She announces, holding the assault rifle close to her chest.
"Did I do something to make you blush?" I ask her as I tighten the canvas over the back of the truck.
UMP giggles and shakes her head.
"It's nothing commander~" she states as she opens the door of the truck.
"Did I do something…?" I mutter to myself, tying the last knot on the canvas tarp.
"Could I take a look at at your gun, 40?" I ask.
She stares at me curiously.
"Which one?" She finally answers.
"Your UMP." I state bluntly, revving up the engine.
"Alright~" she says, handing me her submachine gun.
I inspect the gun. Three modes, burst, safe, and full auto. I guess the developers who created her were kind enough to deck out the submachine gun. A suppressor on the barrel, foregrip on the shaft, an acog scope mounted on the top of the gun, and an extended 40 round magazine. I eject the magazine and take a look at the bullets. .40 S&W hollow points, a good choice in my thoughts. Good enough to put down a man with a good two round burst of you know where you're shooting. I slide the magazine back into the gun
"Is something wrong with the gun, Commander?" She asks.
"Nah, I was just curious." I say, handing her back the gun. The truck sputters to life.
"It isn't going to be much, but welcome to what used to be the good old countryside of North Carolina." I chuckle as I drive down the road from my cabin.
"It'll probably be about 0000 hours when we arrive to Wilmington."
40 nods her head.
"I would say, this place is my favorite part of driving away from my cabin" I say, pointing out the window.
The landscape changes from trees to a view plentiful of grain fields and some grape orchards. The slow setting sun makes the fields glow a hue of comforting gold, and the rain slowly making a soft rainbow.
"Uwaa~! It's amazing!" 40 says. I chuckle, rolling down my window slightly.
"Welcome to North Carolina, or what it was called back before the war."
I reach over to the radio and turn it on. Even though almost no radio stations are still active, sometimes there are stations that still active, made by survivors in FEMA cities and such like that, playing prewar songs that were popular in the day.
"It's now 1802 hours here down in North Carolina, weather seems to be less rainy now. With the last of the sunlight slowly going down, I believe it is a good time to play this country piece." The man in the station says.
The familiar sound of a guitar starts playing in the background.
"Almost heaven, West Virginia. Blue ridge mountains, Shenandoah river" the song starts.
I look over at 40, her head is literally out the window, seemingly enjoying the wind.
"Life is older there, older than the trees, younger than the mountains, blowing like the breeze."
I find myself singing to the song, as I found it fitting with the background.
"Country Roads, take me home, to the place I belong, West Virginia, mountain mama, take me home, country roads."
Let me tell you, sometimes times like these makes you feel like there was no such thing as a World War Three, only the feelings of some kind of fuzziness inside of you. I don't know how to feel with the new addition of UMP 40, but I'm sure it'll work out somehow.