Teaser

Muggelheim was a short drive from the marina, just thirty minutes even accounting for the state of the roads. Paul parked the vehicle on a dead-end street a block away from the Muggelheim Gasthaus and the two of them hopped off, weapons in hand. Together they proceeded down the street and around the block, where they emerged on a boulevard. The twin streets parted to accommodate a cobblestone median, at the center of which was the entrance to the station.

The two of them followed the road along the edge of the street towards the U-Bahn station Hoffmann had told them about. To Hans' surprise the road by the station's entrance had collapsed at some point, sloping down like a ramp onto the U-Bahn rail below. Hans and Paul stood by the edge, looking down into the subway. Hans noticed a few human ribcages scattered below, most of them partially crushed or missing ribs outright, and frowned again. The skeletons were still wearing the tattered and shredded remains of the EAA uniforms, their weapons scattered nearby along with hundreds of shell casings. "For God's sake please don't be a Wanamingo," he said.

"Yeah," Paul said, and crouched. "No flammenwerfer for you to use this time." He stood and began easing himself down the steep incline and Hans joined him, the two of them going slow and keeping as quiet as they could. They reached the end of the slope and stepped onto the station platform, looking around. Both lines were open, except for the part where the road had collapsed, leaving three tunnels to pick from.

Hans crossed the platform and looked left. Barely twenty yards down the tunnel was blocked by a subway car, left to lie on the tracks for the rest of time. "Not going this way," Hans said, and Paul nodded. The two remaining tunnels stretched on before both of them, darkness quickly swallowing the daylight that poured in from the hole in the ceiling.

"We could split up," Paul said.

"Forget it. Too dangerous," Hans said. "We'll just take them one at a time. Let's start with the left." The two of them approached the tunnel and flicked on their flashlights, cutting into the darkness with the pale yellow beams. The tunnel curved left as it went. The sign above the tunnel declaring the next stop dangled from a single chain, part of its glass façade broken and exposing the Nixie tubes within. A sign on the wall between both tunnels advertised nearby attractions.

Hans and Paul eased themselves onto the track and began slowly walking down its curving length, watching the offshoots and utility doors. As they went they passed more ribcages and scattered remains, and Hans' unease grew. Dark, narrow places were exactly the kind of spots that Wanamingos loved to hang out in. No doubt because the darkness made it harder for their prey to see, a problem that the Wanamingo didn't have to deal with considering its lack of eyes. How they navigated or hunted, Hans still didn't know.

They reached a spot where the tunnel widened out to accommodate a neighboring track and stopped, aiming their flashlights around the gaping darkness. A few subway trains were on the tracks, stopped in place. Navigation hazards. Or cover, depending on your perspective. Hans flashed his light through their windows, remembering the Wanamingos from the Tiergarten tunnel, but there was nothing there.

He looked back at Paul just as the ground shook. Once, twice, then it was still. Each of them cocked an eyebrow and looked around again, confused. Hans aimed his flashlight at the tracks and the ground shook again, hard enough for the pebbles to bounce. "What the Hell is that..." he whispered.

"Let's keep moving," Paul said. The two of them continued down the tunnel, instinctively spreading out, their flashlight beams sweeping through the darkness. They joined up again as they neared a wide utility door, open. They peered inside, weapons at the ready, but it was just a large transformer room, home to a family of four. A mother, a father, and two children, judging by the skeletons. Hans grimaced and took a closer look, curious. The bones had been picked clean and sported numerous teeth marks, and Hans picked one up. As he did so his hand bumped against an empty shell casing and he aimed the flashlight to follow. It rolled until it hit another casing, the tinny sound strangely loud in the silence. The light caught the glint of another shell casing. And another. And another. Hans stood and aimed the flashlight at the ceiling, bathing the whole room in light, and was shocked to see that the floor was littered with hundreds of spent shell casings, all courtesy of the empty MG-42 in the corner, skeletal hands still clutching it. Paul saw what he was looking at and grimaced. "What takes hundreds of 8mm Mauser and doesn't die?" he asked.

"A Wanamingo," Hans said grimly. He aimed the light at the threshold of the door, expecting to see dried green blood, but the only stains were brown. He aimed the light at the wall, not surprised to see hundreds of bullet pockmarks, and then looked back at the empty MG-42. Human blood turned brown over time, but there was very little blood on the wall or the floor outside the room. Inside was another story, of course, but clearly whatever had killed these people had walked away.

Without ammo the MG-42 was dead weight, so Hans decided to leave it behind. The two of them started moving down the tracks again, now more cautiously eyeing the doorways they passed. Each contained a utility room, transformer room, or break room, and were home to little more than the perennial radroach. Hans was beginning to think that whatever they were looking for had moved on when they happened across another wide utility door, also open. Hans looked inside, another subway tunnel on the other side. He and Paul stood before the threshold, aiming their lights through the opening.

"What do you think?" Paul asked. "Go through, or keep following the tracks?"

"Not keen on leaving an open door behind us. Let's close it for now and come back," Hans said, and Paul nodded. He covered Hans as he approached the doorway and looked for the switch that controlled the door. He aimed the light at the doorframe and frowned.

"What is it?"

Hans approached the doorway, his flashlight beam crawling up the frame. The ground shook again, just once, but he ignored it. "There are marks on the wall here," he said, taking a closer look. The wall was made of concrete or limestone, very thick and hard. The marks were more like gouges, and there was a pattern. A pattern of three, like fingers...

Or claws.

"Rovers," Hans said, a little relieved. "Should've known. There are Rovers down here. That's what's been killing the travelers." He straightened up and turned back to face Paul and saw him staring up at the ceiling, aiming his light at it. "What's wrong?"

"...Look."

Hans looked up, bringing his own flashlight up, and stared at the concrete ceiling. There were some marks there, but he wasn't sure what exactly he was supposed to be seeing. He swept the light back and forth, trying to figure out what had Paul so spooked. He took another look at the marks and realized they were gouges. Single gouges, stretching across the masonry as if someone had dragged a giant knife across it. Hans stood there, staring at the ceiling, when the floor shook again.

*THUMP!* *THUMP!*

"What is that?" Paul hissed, aiming his light at the open door. Hans clipped his light to the FG42 and aimed it into the maw of darkness, instinctively backing away from the opening. The ground continued to shake, steadily, thumping hard enough to make the pebbles bounce every other second. The thumping was soon joined by a second noise; the sound of something hitting the floor, plodding along. Footsteps. Hans and Paul backed off to the safety of a nearby subway car and kept their guns trained on the opening. The thumping, the plodding, continued, soon joined by a third noise. A deep, guttural, wheezing sound. Breathing.

A clawed hand gripped the doorframe, the tips of the talons scratching the masonry, and Hans' eyes widened. The claws were massive. Easily a foot long each. A fourth sound joined the menacing symphony. The sound of bone raking across concrete. Hans looked, watched, as the abomination rounded the corner, bathed in the glow of their flashlights. Its hide was a tannish orange, its eyes pure white with no pupils. Two horns jutted forward from the top of its scaled head, scratching against the ceiling. As it stepped into the threshold it turned its head to look at them, claws digging further into the stone. It hunched down and stepped through the threshold, a row of spines on its back scraping along the ceiling and leaving fresh scratches.

The creature saw them, bared a mouth full of razor sharp teeth, and roared.

Fallout Germany 3
November 15, 2024