Being in the basement of the church, there's was no light flooding in through the windows or anything. After my dream, after is breached the surface and was flooded by light, I shot awake. I was breathing heavily and sweating. The dimly lit candles provided a fair amount if light to see with. I looked around and saw the other a sleeping in the small bedding areas. I couldn't tell who was where or how many there were because I was still a bit tired and lazy and it was too dark for me to see just yet. I got up as my eyes started to adjust and I decided to walk. It had been some time since I had last been in a church, perhaps I could offer up some prayers. I quietly got out of the bed and stood up. I was still a little sweaty and trying to cool off. I walked to the other side of the room where there was a hallway. I don't know where I'm going, but if can find my way around.
I walked down the hallway and at the end, to the left was a staircase leading up. I walked up the stairs and was in the lobby of the church. I walked past the offices, up a few more stairs and found myself in the rectory. I walked down the aisle, past the pews, and slowly began to approach the altar. Once I was at the stairs to the altar I knelt down and just looked up at the cross with Jesus nailed to it. I looked at it, looked at him, it looked like he was looking back at me. I let out a sigh, I wanted to pray, but now that I'm here I feel like I don't want to anymore. I just looked at the cross and a handful of thoughts floated in my head. Then I thought about the dream I had last night, about drowning, swimming, leaving my past in the dark.
"I've figured out how to swim... But what am I swimming to?" I asked out loud. I don't know why I verbally asked that, I suppose that I half expected somebody to answer me back. When nobody did, I let out another sigh. I felt like Jesus would just walk right off that cross and pat me on the back... Kind if a strange thing to expect. Light had flooded into the room, it was morning, and the light filed the room with incandescent glowing spots of color on the ground and the walls. I cupped my hands together, almost about to pray or something, but I have up on it. I just knelt there thinking... Something about being in front of the altar gave me a sense of moral comfort.
"What are your problems child?" Asked a woman voice close behind me. Surprised, I quickly looked back to see Sister Gertrude walking towards me with a smile on her face. She walked over and knelt down next to me.
"There's too many to list..." I said. She smiled and let out a silent chuckle.
"There often are..." She said. "Luckily the Lord hears all prayers..."
"Sometimes I don't think he hears mine..."
"Of course he does..." She said. "The Lord works in mysterious ways, as you know... I'm sure that everything will work out in the end."
"I can't tell you how many times I've heard that..." I said. "I used to believe that everything would be fine in the end, that I would get what I want, and that everybody would be happy in the end... But now... Well, I'm just not so sure anymore."
"Not always do we really know what we want, or what we need..." Said the sister. "We live our lives thinking to ourselves that we've got everything we could ever want, but still have that hollowness in our hearts... It's only the people that can find the missing piece that can fill in that hollowness, those are the people that can truly find happiness... And comfort." She said. The whole church went silent for a moment, I've never really been in a church this quiet before. Usually there's an organ praying, or a priest preaching, or choirs singing. But there was just silence, until I spoke up.
"Tell me sister..." I said taking a brief pause waiting for her to fully direct her attention to me. "...do you believe that there's a way to be good again?"
"Yes..." She said with a smile, a very reassuring smile that made me smile too. I felt a little more confident now, a little more at ease.
"Thank you..." I said standing up.
"Alex...are you in here?" Asked a voice from beyond the church hallway. Then is as Derek and twilight walking out from behind the two large doors and spotting me. "There you are..." Said twilight.
"We figured you would be here..." Said Derek.
"Hey..." I said walking over.
"Are you okay?" Asked twilight.
"Yeah...I'm fine," I replied. "We should be heading out now..." I said. "We're burning daylight."
"If you must leave...then may god be with you on your journey..." Said the sister walking over. I smiled at her, and we prepared ourselves to leave. We retrieved our guns, and the backpack of ammo and food and we left the church. We left a good deal of the guns and ammo with the people in the church and wished them luck as we headed out. We had to go out the back and circle around just to avoid the rifleman in the town hall. Once we were clear we found the main road again and started making our way through the rest of the town. The road went downhill as we left the town center which really was just one big hill. Once the hill leveled out and the road was flat again we started to make our way through. We came to a part of town which looked like the busier place. A large road with lots of stores to the sides of it. To the left was a big supermarket with a bunch of smaller stores built into the main building like a coffee shop, a burger joint, and a bank. There were traffic lights hanging up and some had fallen down and shattered. Cars littered the street and made it more difficult to traverse the streets. It only made sense that when the explosion went off in the middle of the day people would have crashed their cars left and right.
Luckily as we were making our way through all of the traffic and through the streets, we didn't run into any problems. The roads were quiet and everything was dead silent a except for our feet hitting the ground. We didn't talk much, mostly because we were watching out for anything suspicious or useful. When we originally walked through the gate I was somewhat hoping we would find some kind of vehicle, but that was just a foolish dream. I'm almost certain that every single car is fried, and even if there was one that wasn't, we wouldn't be able to drive it anywhere with the streets the way they are. We kept making our way along until we passed all of the shops and stores and soon houses and other streets began to branch off the sides of the road. A few smaller stores here and there, and a few in-home businesses, but nothing big. There was a large highway that ran right across the road we were on, a big bridge right above us. It didn't look too good, you could see where some cars had veered off the side and flew down to the ground. Luckily it isn't collapsed or anything. We started to make our way through the bridge when twilight stopped for a minute.
"What's the matter?" I asked turning back. She lifted up her feet and started to shake them.
"My hooves hurt..." She said.
"Feet, you mean..." I said correcting her.
"Whatever...my feet hurt, we should rest a bit... Maybe get something to drink." She added.
"That does sound like a good idea..." Said Derek.
"Okay...we'll rest..." I said. We've got plenty of water...the people at the church were nice enough to give us some food and water, so I handed out bottles of water for Derek and twilight. We stopped for a moment and rested. I was a bit concerned about resting under this dark bridge, but I couldn't sense and danger.
"Alex...how's your hand doing?" Asked twilight.
"Better..." I said taking off my bandages to see that the once gaping hole that was in my hand was nothing more than a nasty looking flesh wound. I did focus a lot of my energy into healing it while I was conscious. "It's doing much better...and look... I can move my fingers again..." I said wiggling my fingers for emphasis.
"That's good." Said twilight. "You know...your kind make some very scary weapons..."
"I suppose they are...but there are weapons which are even more terrifying." Said Derek.
"How do these things work anyway?" Asked twilight.
"Basically it's like a really advance bow and arrow, the bow fires automatically and the arrow is a small metal bullet... No bigger than a thumb, most of the times." I said. "Some guns, like the one that I have, shoots larger bullets than the pistol you have."
"How do they work?" Repeated twilight.
"Basically each bullet is encased in a small metal shell..." Said Derek.
"In the shell there's an explosive substance we call gun powder, when you pull the trigger, a small hammer in the gun hits the shell causing the explosive powder to ignite." I added.
"The explosion causes the bullet to be ejected from the casing at rapid speeds and it comes out of the barrel of the gun." Finished Derek. "They're very dangerous weapons because they do a lot of damage, and they are also very fast and can't be dodged or blocked..."
"Oh...that sounds complicated." She said.
"I figured since you like science that you'd appreciate it a little." I said.
"Hmm...Not really... I like science that bases around learning and understanding, not how to build futuristic weapons of war." She said. "I can only hope that these kinds of weapons stay in your world... And not mine..."
"It'll only be a matter of time before those who carve power figure out a way..." I said. "You've already got ships with cannons...that's pretty much how it began, next come muskets, really old guns made of wood and metal that shoot just like cannons, except smaller."
"Geez...that sounds terrible." She said.
"Well, in this world, like it or not, there's only one form of art...and that's the art of war. Humans have been killing humans for as long as we can remember."
"Why?" Asked twilight. "Rarely have there been wars between ponies, and when there have been they've been over crucial topics such as survival of an entire nation." The only war going on now that I can think of is between the scarlet army and the indigo nation to the south in the mountains... We did go there on our journey..."
"Yeah... But modern warfare is very vicious stuff." I said. "Now we have scopes to focus in on enemies, missiles that create large explosions. Planes that fly through the air at supersonic speeds dropping bombs, chemicals, napalm which is basically a fire bomb... And we've got bigger weapons than just those."
"I dare ask..." She said.
"For one... The hydrogen bomb..." Said Derek.
"Is that some bog bomb?" Asked twilight.
"Very big..." I said. "In fact, if a hydrogen bomb went off in this place instead of the gate melting down. The explosion radius would be a lot bigger, and instead of survivors and mutants, everything would have been destroyed." I said. " The initial explosion is solid two miles in diameter, and then the after laying blast of energy and heat would destroy all organic matter for another hundred or so miles. People that weren't killed would be sickened by the radiation poisoning, or disfigured form the immense heat... It's easily the most destructive weapon created..."
"Why would you ever build something like that?" Asked twilight.
"Power of course..." Said Derek.
"And because we can..." I added. "It's been a two or so centuries since the last one was ever dropped... But the blast was enough to end an entire war."
"So you drop this bomb, and its amazing power would cause the other nation to give up." Said twilight.
"That's what most people believe...but that blast didn't just leave the other nation scared... It destroyed the entire country...there was nothing left. After that their people crumbled and now they are no more..." I said. "It's a quick way to end a war...and an even better way to make sure that more wars don't start...or, as most countries like to see it, it's a good thing to flash around, like a show of power."
"Humans don't sound very nice." Said twilight.
"Generally we aren't..." I said. "But there are people who are good, like the people back at the church... Those people are nice, but sometimes when we get scared we become violent...the same can be said about anything else. The only thing is, when we decide to get violent, we've got a lot of big and heavy sticks lying around to defend ourselves with."
"Starting a war is one thing...but ending it is an entirely different thing." Said Derek. "Trust me...both Alex and I have experience...we've been to war before...and its hell."
"I imagine it is..." Said twilight. "So how do humans wage war." Asked twilight.
"Any way we can..." Said Derek.
"There's an old saying, all's fair in love and war." I said. "We do whatever it takes to win, strategies, well placed bombs, assassinations of officials, basic combat and battles, and we make allies, we cut off supplies to the other countries, make them hungry, leave them without power or water or food... Anything we can." I said. "War is basically a game of two way torture, you try and inflict the most damage on the other person as you can until somebody gives in... Or dies..."
"That's the tragic truth to it all." Said Derek.
"I can't relate to well... Sure, I've been in my fair share of confrontations... But I've never been in an all out war... And I'm glad I'm not..." She said taking another sip of her water. There was silence for a few minutes and we finished out waters and tossed the bottle onto the ground.
"Alright...we should get glowing now..." Said Derek.
"Good idea..." I said.
"My feet are feeling better now, so yeah, we should head out." Said twilight as we all stood up and started to make our way through the streets. Now that the scenery has become more rural than urban, the streets aren't as filled up with cars as they used to be, making it easier to walk around. I kept my senses sharp, making sure I didn't catch anything in my area of influence. I did sense some evil presences in the houses and stuff, but those must just be the night walkers, as long as nothing is outside or approaching us, I didn't see any reason to cause alarm.
"It's quiet..." Said Derek.
"Well...I figured that it might be... I didn't think there would be hoards of those things out here... It seems like the vast majority of them can only survive at night, from what the people at the church told us." I said. "Still... We need to be cautious...we did run into that one tall thing yesterday." I said. They both nodded as we started to make our way under another bridge, this one was very dark as well, but like before, I could t sense any signs of danger under it, which is strange. You'd think that a damp, and dark place like this would be perfect for those mutants to hide under when the light came up. We started moving under the bridge and I kept myself on guard, until twilight said something.
"Hey...what's that?" Asked twilight pointing to something. We looked back at her to see that she was looking upwards. We both looked up and what I saw was strangely familiar. It was a spider's web, a big one, except... Like before at the police station, in the lounge... This one was woven out of some kind of flesh like substance. It stuck and clung to the underside of the bridge and pulsed slightly, though there was a spider web, there was no spider.
"Oh god...what the hell is that?" Asked Derek looking up. "It looks like some kind of web of meat."
"I saw something like this at the station..." I said. "It was like human flesh, but sticky and alive... It didn't look like a web before...but now."
"Hey...didn't the guy from the church say that a while ago they saw a spider like thing pass through the common." Said twilight.
"That's a good assumption..." I said. "There could be a very real chance that the spider spun this..."
"Whatever it is...it doesn't look like its home." Said Derek.
"There isn't anything under the bridge too..." I said.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Asked twilight.
"Well...look where we are...its dark, and damp, and out of the sunlight, this should be the perfect place for mutants to be taking shelter...yet there are none." I said gesturing to the whole area around us. "Same thing with the last bridge... I think that this spider thing eats the mutants."
"I didn't see a web at the last bridge..." Said twilight.
"We might have overlooked it, maybe we didn't check the underside like this one here..." I said.
"True..." She admitted.
"So are you saying that this thing only eats mutants?" Asked Derek.
"I'm saying that it does eat mutants...but I don't think there's much stopping it from trying to eat the regular people too." I said. "And based on their description of the thing, if we run into it, I don't think that guns alone are going to save us."
"I remember them saying that when they saw it last it moved past the common towards the police station... Which is... The direction... We took." Said twilight.
"So basically we're moving closer and closer to that thing..." I said.
"Yeah, but they said that was like a month ago..." Added Derek.
"Yeah. But how long do you think it nested in these places we passed." I said. "Seeing how it works, it's smart... A real hunter, hiding and making its nest in places where it knows the mutants will hide from the light." I said. "It also might be why there aren't many things around to hunt us. This things been thinning out the herd... Literally like a spider eating Mosquitoes..."
"Except, the spider eats people too..." Said twilight.
"So far that thing has been moving down the same path we have to take, hopefully it'll change directions and we won't have to deal with it." I said.
"What happens if we do have to deal with it?" Asked Derek.
"Well... I have no idea what it looks like... Other than its a spider, a basic description isn't enough Intel for me to know what I'm fighting, so unfortunately if it comes to that, we'll have to learn as we fight..." I said as we started to move forward from under the bridge and following the road again. Now we were in real rural roads, there were dead trees and forests all around us, past a few trees to the right was a large pond which glimmered in the sunlight. A few houses in the midst of the trees and paths leading up to them.
"It's kinda hard to believe that something like this would happen..." Said Derek.
"I know what you mean." I said. "It is rather unbelievable."
"How do you suppose something like this happened?" Asked Derek.
"The arch melted down..." I said confused by the question since he should know.
"No... I mean the mutants...why are they here, how did the people mutate?" He asked.
"Oh... Well I have a theory... But it's a work in progress." I said. "Since the arch was a magical artifact, when I exploded I don't think the explosion was radioactive, but it was a magical overload. It flooded and soaked everything in magic, and I guess people couldn't take the magical pressure since we aren't magical creatures... It probably caused them to mutate or evolve. The magic changed them... At least, that's what I think."
"Sounds believable..." Said twilight. "Normally items or even beings who have an over gross amount of magic can suffer from disfiguration or even changes in form or soul." Said twilight. "Normally its people who have more pure souls that are able to handle magic better than others..." She said. "Maybe the people that changed where the ones who weren't that pure, maybe they've committed crimes, or some of them were just exposed to too much magical energy than others."
"Do you really think that's what happened?" Asked Derek.
"It sounds believable..." I said. "At least to us because we know about magic." Derek just slouched a little and let out a defeated sigh.
"What a mess this is..." He said. "What do you think happens after this?" He asked. "You think that they'll actually try and fix this...or are all the people in here doomed now?"
"It's hard to say..." I said. "Obviously these people don't have good ways of defending themselves, or even have any kind of professional training... To be honest...it's not looking good for the remaining people..." I said. "I wouldn't be surprised if they decided to be done with it all and just glass the whole wasteland..."
"Glass it?" Asked twilight confused by the term.
"They'll drop napalm all over the place." I said. She still gave me that curious look. "Napalm is a flammable gel, once a napalm bomb drops and the napalm is ignited the gel then explodes everywhere and sticks to surfaces... It's one of the easiest ways to burn everything to the ground."
"Or they could just HIT this place." Said Derek. Twilight again looked confused.
"HIT is an anagram... High Intensity Thermobarics..." I said.
"Thermo...you mean more fire?" Asked twilight.
"It's a two step system, one they drop pressurizer bombs which increase the amount of oxygen in the air and makes it dryer too so then..."
"So then if someone just as much as lights a match, the whole thing goes up in flames..." Said twilight.
"Yeah... After a day of the pressurizers pumping out oxygen, they drop the HIT and it sets the air itself on fire... Destroys everything." Finished Derek.
"Humans have a lot of ways of dealing with their problems." Said twilight.
"That's the way we've always been... If it's a threat, we have to destroy it... There's no reasoning, no peace... At least... Not anymore." I said. "There used to be a time when peace was an option, when America and other nations would lend helping hands to nations in trouble, trying to make the world a better place... But after the Third World War, nobody could trust each other anymore... So now all the countries are constantly at each other's throats. We invade countries smaller than ours, while them out and take their land not just for resources, but economic benefits too and also increase our military variables." I said. "To be honest... I don't regret ever leaving this place and coming to Equestria..."
"Is that why you had a tough time trying to adjust?" Asked twilight.
"I could physically adjust. I walked, talked, and even flew like you all... But in my mind I was still human... I didn't understand customs, didn't know that the world was at peace... I still thought that I had enemies all over... Even more so when there wasn't anybody there to tell me how to act, or what to do... Or even something like a friend I could rely on... Even though the first ponies I met where you fluttershy, pinkie, rarity, rainbow dash, and applejack, I still felt like I was on my own... Like in still couldn't trust you."
"How do you feel now?" Asked twilight.
"Now that I'm back home... I feel like an outside again..." I said. "I feel bad about it... But I cannot deny that this is my home... I embrace that fact actually."
"I feel the same..." Said Derek. "There were times when I even forgot that I was human... And when I remembered I was it was like some shocking revelation, like somebody who has amnesia that finally gets all of their thoughts back, suddenly remembers who they are and who they love, who their friends and family are, you start to suddenly remember names and faces, people and places... Everything that you forgot about."
"All I know now is that I'm sick and tired of having to change constantly..." I said. "I know that my life is chaotic... And I've dragged everybody into it with me... Even you twilight... I'm sorry you have to deal with all this... I'm sorry that you have to go through this..."
"I forgive you Alex... I know I can trust you..." She said smiling. "Besides... I'm the one who decided to tag along even though you told me not to..." She said. "I brought this upon myself..." She said. I smiled at her and she smiled back. We walked a little longer and I kept gazing up at the amber sky with a serious look on my face.
"I always wondered..." I said. "That day...when I first went through the arch... I wondered, what would have happened if I hadn't survived...if I had just died there in the midst of the explosion... Maybe then everything would be normal again... For everybody, and everypony." I said. "We wouldn't be here...and you'd probably be back home with your friends... Maybe sitting on your bed reading a good book, telling spike to go organize the shelves..." I said.
"Alex..." Said twilight seeming worried. At this point my thoughts caused me to stop and so did Derek and twilight stop with me.
"I've died lots of times, and each time I've come back... Maybe... The next time I die... I won't make it... What if I fight shal-grahkan... And I don't survive... What if he does kill me..." I said.
"Alex...that won't happen." Said twilight.
"If he kills me then there's no coming back, there's no second chance... In fact, I'm sure that I've run out of second chances..." I said taking a short pause. "Trouble seems to follow me wherever I go... So what if I just...go away...maybe then nobody else would get hurt, and nothing like this would ever happen again. I tried being a husband, tried being a friend and a father... But look what I've done... I couldn't protect my wife... I couldn't be a real father for my kids, hell I left them all alone, I'm a terrible friend for endangering my other friends... I'm just pathetic..."
"Crimson... You're not pathetic..." Said twilight. "I know that sometimes it's hard, and not all the choices we make are the best, and sometimes there aren't any good options... But you can't blame yourself."
"Then who do I blame?" I asked. "I thought that I could protect everybody, so I played along, I let the powers that be, use me as their pawn...now look where I am... Where we are... In the middle of a wasteland that I used to call home.
"Hey...I don't mean to pry...but that sign up there...isn't that the name of your town?" Asked Derek walking over and tapping my shoulder. I looked over to him and he pointed at a sign that said "welcome to Ashton."
"Huh... I barely noticed..." I said. "It really has been a long time since I was last here..." I said.
"Do you think you could find your way back home...?" Asked twilight.
"It's on the other side of town... We might have to stop for the night before getting there... If so, then I know of a few good places." I said.
"Well, it's not that late...I'd assume that there would be at least six more hours of light in left..." Said Derek looking up at the sky.
"Hey...I just noticed something..." Said twilight.
"What...?" Both Derek and I asked in unison.
"Look at the trees..." She said pointing at the trees looming above and around us.
"What about them?" Asked Derek. He didn't see it at first, but I did.
"They've got leaves..." Said twilight. She was right, the trees here were still healthy summer trees. Fresh green leaves hanging from the branches. Even the houses, lawns, nothing seemed destroyed, there wasn't anything burnt or decayed. In fact you can see the noticeable changes behind us where some trees were slightly more alive than others and some grass was growing, until it got up to Ashton where everything was healthy and living.
"Hey...this place looks like it didn't even get touched..." Said Derek.
"Didn't they also say that this place was a festering cesspool of mutants?" Added twilight making another good point.
"You're right... There's something weird here." I said.
"Is it magic?" Asked Derek.
"Obviously...but I can't make out what kind... It's not an illusion..." I said bending down near a lawn and grabbing a handful of grass. "This grass is real...and I can't feel any distortions... What we're seeing is the real deal."
"So then what is it?" He asked.
"I don't know..." I said. I went to take a step forward when I suddenly heard a strange noise coming from behind the corner of one of the houses. I pointed my gun that way and put my finger on the trigger, Derek held up his gun too, and so did twilight. She held her nervously, but at least she was holding it right. Suddenly a mutant appeared from the other side. It looked hideous, it was average height for a human, but its skin was severely blistered and covered in welts and boils. The boils were thin and visibly full of puss and blood. Some of the boils were as big as softballs. It made some strange inhalant noise and started to stagger towards us. I quickly fired my gun at it and the impact caused all of the blisters and boils to burst spewing a viscous fluid all over the lawn and the side of the house. I watched as then the fluid staining the house and lawn began to melt to wood and the dirt and grass like acid.
"Geez, that thing was disgusting..." Said twilight.
"It looks like the fluid inside of them is severely corrosive, keep that in mind." I said. I was soon going to point out that we shouldn't attack them up close, but I was interrupted by a loud and echoing scream that seemed to resonate from a few houses back to our right. We shot our attention over and went quiet.
"What was that?" Asked twilight.
"Something that isn't human..." I said.
"It sounded like someone was in trouble..." Said Derek. He was about to go running off before I grabbed him and pulled him back.
"That wasn't a terrified shriek, that was an aggressive shout... Whatever it was, it isn't our friend..." I said. The yell sounded off again, this time louder, and closer. Whatever was yelling was being hidden by the trees and houses to our right. It's most likely dashing through back yards. There was a third yell followed by some more, quieter, aggressive howls and snarls which were accompanied by loud bangs and noises coming from the backyard of the house to the right of us. Then there was a loud wooden bash and a fourth yell which came from inside of the house. Followed by that there was a violent bang on the front door, which was boarded up.
"Looks like it found us..." I said pointing my gun at the door. There was another violent banging and I started shooting the door hoping that the bullets will penetrate. Twilight started shooting at the same time Derek did. I put a couple bullets in the door and stopped, twilight and Derek followed. Twilight was able to aim and shoot the gun without hurting herself, but her aim wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either. There was silence now, in couldn't hear the thud of a body on the ground so I kept my gun up just in case. We waited there in eerie silence for something to happen, as time passed I began to conclude that whatever it was is dead now.
"I think its dead..." Said Derek putting his gun down along with twilight. I was about to out my gun down when there was another loud shout as a being burst through the door taking it right off the hinges. We put our guns back up and got a good look at the thing. It was a man, but he was wearing white binding pants and a straight jacket. His arms were of no use to him. His teeth were razor sharp and he was very jittery. Constantly turning his head and twitching. His legs had claws on them and his body was badly bruised and beaten up, and he was foaming from his mouth. He kept passing glances from us to everything else, like he couldn't keep his attention focused. But when I looked at his eyes I knew that wasn't the case. Both of his eyes were dead, not just blind, but it looked like somebody sliced them to shreds with a knife or something. He perked his head up and started to sniff the air and snarl.
"Look, its blind..." Said Derek which immediately caught the mutant's attention. The mutant put its gaze towards him like he could see him with his wrecked eyes.
"But not deaf..." I whispered back. The creature then let out a deafening scream and bolted towards Derek with unreal speed. Derek quickly propped up his shotgun and pulled the trigger, but amazingly the mutant was able to take the entire full force of the shot and keep sprinting towards Derek. Surprised, Derek's only other thought was to quickly jump out of the way. He dove to the right towards us and the beast ran past him. After a few o'er feet the creature haunted and started to flail around like it was upset that it didn't get Derek. It wasn't bleeding, but the shotgun wounds were there. The beast then started to flail around some more and lazily walked over to a telephone pole still twitching and shivering. Once he reached the pole the beast started to beat its head against the pole. It let out aggravated sounding grunts with every hit. Annoyed now, it let out another deafening scream and then sunk its teeth into the telephone pole. The side of its mouth which had been cut allowed it a bigger mouth, and by some inhuman means it was able to open its mouth twice as wide as a humans, almost biting the entirety of the telephone poles width. The beast then ripped out a huge chuck of the wooden pole causing it to become unbalanced and to fall of an adjacent house. The worse snapped and the pole fell of the house cutting through the roof and it stopped.
"That thing scares me..." Said twilight. Twilights words then alarmed the creature and it screamed once more and started to sprint in twilight direction. She was completely in prepared, but by some miraculous chance I pointed my gun at the thing and fired a shot at its head. The bullet broke through its skull and the beast leaned to the left from the force. It looked like it would trip and fall dead, but it recovered somehow and now adjusted its course towards me with it mouth wide open and teeth gleaming in the light. Surprised I quickly dodged out of the way and it ran past me. I didn't dodge out of the way too well, but well enough. The beast tripped over one of my feet and fell to the ground. I quickly recovered but instead of getting up the beast laid on its back and flailed on the ground. It squirmed and kicked its legs in the air furiously. It let out a series of aggressive shouted and yells as it writhed on the ground.
"Jesus, how do we kill this thing?" Asked Derek. The beast made notice of his voice by then screaming at his direction but it was unable to get up, as it continuously flailed on the ground, which is surprisingly not that scary. It shouldn't be that hard for it to get up, arms or not.
"I don't know... Hopefully it'll stay on its back forever." I said as I picked up my gun and started to shoot at it as I laid on the ground. Eventually I ran out of bullets and had to switch clips, still the beast lived.
"Okay...so guns don't work..." Said twilight. "Anything else?" She asked.
"I've got something..." I said putting my gun away and holding up my right hand. I snapped my fingers and the beast suddenly burst into flames and began to burn and roast. It let out screams of pain as its flesh began to turn and char. It screamed and flailed, but its energy began to gave and its deafening screams soon turned into guttural choking sounds as its last breaths escaped its lungs. Then it went silent and just quietly burned on the ground. "There... I killed it."
"Well...that's certainly one way." Said twilight.
"I hope we don't run into those things anymore." Said Derek.
"We should hurry... This place might not be packed with mutants... But it certainly is dangerous..." Twilight and Derek agreed and we started to make our way through the streets again. As we started walking through I kept looking around and the neighborhood houses and the buildings and decorations, it started reminding me of home. This place wasn't much different from the rest of the wasteland. Cars were abandoned in the middle of the street, roads were cracked, houses torn and boarded up. But the trees and grass were lively and vivid, there were even flowers and bushes growing in gardens and flower pots near houses and windows. It almost felt like this could still be a livable neighborhood. Looking around started to bring back fond memories of the town I used to grow up in.
And left me with a bittersweet feeling inside...
-Authors Note: hey guys, hope you enjoyed this chapter and the last make sure to leave a review, they always help. things are drawing to an end. there's only one more chapter after this before the fight then there might be one or two more chapters after that... might. its almost over...sweet Jesus its almost over. anyways... im going to post the last two chapters as a whole since they are small, so in reality...there's only one more chapter...i lied. so ill see you guys in the end... until then...
-Stay Shady~