Apocalypse: UK
Hey everyone. I wanted to apologize for delaying everything for so long, but life's had me in its clutches, and I simply haven't been able to write anything these past few weeks. During that time, I stumbled upon something I wrote a long time ago, and decided to bring the characters and the story back to life. Please tell me what you think!
Apocalypse: UK
Chapter 1 - "Informal Introductions"
Sergei sat on the broken bed of a broken apartment building, watching the broken world outside sit still in eerie silence. The sun wailed down on the ruins of London, heating the crumbling buildings to unbearable temperatures and making any exposed liquids boil. All floras that grew outdoors were dry, burned to a crisp by the sheer ferocity of sunlight.
What was once perceived as one of the major harbours of civilization on Earth now lay dead - an abandoned, dishevelled mess. The Underground had collapsed in many locations, leaving it unfit for any kind of travel. Most of the taller buildings on the island had also succumbed to heavy bombing, leaving behind nothing but big piles of rubble and rebar.
As for the occupants? Most were dead. The majority of those who weren't had suffered sporadic mutation, which turned them into monsters beyond one's wildest nightmares.
Raising a gloved hand, Sergei removed a cigarette from his mouth and let go a puff of blue smoke. The same hand was then turned, as if to look at a watch, but instead of a timepiece Sergei's wrist was covered by a large, grey gauntlet. Tapping an indent in the gauntlet caused a blue holographic screen to blink into existence, showing all kinds of information concerning the environment - ranging from current temperature right down to the amount of dust in the air.
The Russian had come upon this little treasure while raiding an abandoned military outpost up the country from London. It was a research facility, no doubt, and he had to fight his way through a large number of zombies and mutants in order to get anything worthwhile. It would have been safe to assume that all of the muties had crawled out of the facility, but upon closer inspection, one could see that there were simply too many to fit inside. Something had attracted them to the location, and there were even more when Sergei escaped with the gauntlet and a stockpile of food and munitions.
He hadn't looked for the source of attraction, but assumed that it had something to do with vats of green liquid stored deep inside the bowels of the underground bunker. Nothing lived in the green liquid, as far he could tell.
Sergei poked the holographic projection, then slid his finger down it to scroll. Once he found the feature he wanted to use, he poked again. A window popped up to the projection, displaying Sergei's grizzled face. He couldn't help but cringe every time he saw himself; sad, sunken eyes looked out of a rather emaciated face, the state of which was only covered by a thick, dirty beard.
A small red button stood out on the blue display. He tapped it, and a counter started, the letters REC flashing next to it.
"Video log of Sergei Demitreyev, number 155. June fifteenth, twenty-seventeen. Three years since the attack. I am running out of food and water, and I have no ammunition left in my handgun." To demonstrate, he drew his M9 Beretta and let the magazine slide out into his hand. He pointed the top to the camera to show the utter emptiness. "The only bullets I have left for my assault rifle are in its magazine right now. Six rounds, counting the one in the chamber."
The weapon Sergei was referring to was an L86 he'd taken from a killed Royal Guard. It had a bayonet attached, along with a laser sight he mounted himself, but not much else. Under normal circumstances, Sergei wouldn't have attacked a fellow survivor. But the guardsman took a fancy to the Russian's backpack. A quick fight ensued, at the end of which Sergei pulled the bayonet off the man's rifle and jammed it into the side of his head.
"Tonight, when the sun goes down, I will make my way to the shopping centre down the road. I expect resistance, but without water I won't survive. End log."
The gauntlet blinked and Sergei was in the shadows once more. He took a roll of clothing from his backpack and laid it on the bed where he sat. After making sure the door was properly barricaded, he leaned over and laid his head on the roll, closing his eyes.
Fire.
Burning.
Flames lick flesh, make the skin bubble, break out in blisters.
But it's not Sergei on the fire.
A woman, judging by the agonized screaming. She howls in sheer terror and pain, immobilised on a pike. Sergei feels tears fall down his cheeks. He's crying, bawling his eyes out, begging for the pain to stop.
The screaming turns into cries.
"Help me!"
She chokes on smoke, a realisation dawning on her. She isn't going to survive. A different tone penetrates the crackle of flames, one filled with fearful strength.
"Sergei, I love you!"
The Russian awoke, calling out a name which he forgot before it could even register. Sweat rolled down his forehead, made his already stinking clothing clammy. He sat up, realising that he was hyperventilating. Closing his eyes, Sergei forced himself to calm down. Slowly, his heart rate levelled out, as did his breath.
Dusk outside. The sun had almost disappeared beyond the horizon, allowing the city to cool. Sergei just hoped it wouldn't be too hot to traverse.
As he packed up, the Russian kept thinking about his nightmares. They had plagued him incessantly for months now, ever since he lost his memory in a sudden onset of amnesia. Had he known something of psychology aside from how to read a person, Sergei would have pieced together the symptoms - nightmares, amnesia, headaches - and come to a conclusion that his brain didn't want him to know what had happened.
Only extremely traumatising events could cause such a reaction.
Sergei stopped before leaving. He saw a mirror in the bathroom of the apartment - undamaged and even acceptably clean. Dropping his backpack, he trudged inside, gravel and wood crackling under his boots with each step. The inside of the bathroom was grimy and dusty, but not as damaged as the living room, whose window had been blown in.
Instinctively, Sergei checked the taps. Their handles emitted squeaks while being turned, but not even a gurgle came from inside.
What did I expect?
Having established the integrity of the sink to be nil, he moved on to what had actually caught his eye. The mirror. A quick wipe with his glove and it was pretty much clean. Again, that ghastly, ghoulish face showed itself. It made Sergei want to claw at it until there was nothing left. He even drew his knife, but instead of slashing away, his hand had different ideas.
Sergei began to shave.
Sure, dry-shaving isn't pleasant, but what other choices does a man have when common toiletries are no longer in production? Slowly but surely, the face fuzz started to disappear, revealing Sergei's wide jaw and cracked lips. Ten minutes later, with the knife hanging from his gloved hand, the Russian looked himself over, finding his appearance a bit less hideous than it had been.
What brought Sergei even more joy was the fact that he could now cover his face with his bandana without being incessantly annoyed by his itching beard. So he did exactly that while leaving the apartment with his belongings.
The journey down the stairs was long and arduous. Sergei had to be careful - one wrong step would mean the staircase crumbling beneath his feet and letting him drop to a painful mangling.
While on his way past the third floor, the Sergei heard laughter. He would have raised his weapon, but this laughter was that of a woman. The sound sent a shiver up his spine, making him feel like the very fingers of the Reaper had taken hold of his heart. And still he turned, walking towards the origin of the sound. It came from behind a locked door. Sergei drew his combat knife and jammed it into the lock. When the door opened, he pushed his way inside.
Inside, the house was remarkably clean, despite a thin layer of dust. None of the damage from outside had gotten in, and the only signs of neglect were the dead flowers on certain tables, stale bread on the kitchen counter and completely decomposed remains of fruit which sat in a bowl on the dining room table. Overall, the apartment had a cosy feel, despite the destruction.
Sergei traced the laughter to a door whose outer side was covered by butterfly stickers. He reached out and twisted the handle, feeling his heart pounding in his chest. This was no longer a fearless murderer, but a lump of jelly in Kevlar and boots.
Pushing the door open, he entered the room and surveyed his surroundings. Pink walls whose wallpaper was beginning to shrivel and fall away. Toys scattered here and there - Barbie dolls mostly, and a few plastic animals. Sergei treated the room like a minefield, stepping in places that weren't populated by plastic, and made his way to the bed. On it lay a blanket, exposing the shape of something Sergei knew all too well.
Once he was close enough, the Russian took hold of one of the blanket's corners and lifted it.
A girl. No older than ten. Ashen skin clinging to a skeleton, eyes long gone. The lips were pulled back from her teeth by the effect of drying out, and her hair stuck to her head in untidy clumps.
But the fact that she had been laid out on the bed so lovingly meant...
Sergei spun around, raising his rifle in the process. But there was nobody in the room aside from him and the corpse. He was getting rusty - logical thinking would have prevented him from making such a useless manoeuvre - he would have heard the assailant approaching before they even entered the room.
Lowering the rifle again, Sergei let out a frustrated sigh. He turned back to the bed. He removed his glove and held it with his free hand. His now bare other hand went to the girl's forehead. Sergei focused.
***
With a flash that could be compared to one that is experienced during a blow to the head, Sergei was looking through the eyes of the little girl. She was sitting on her bed, blanket pulled up to her neck and her knees hugged to her chest. A steady stream of tears was rolling down her face as she watched the flashes outside through her white curtains.
From behind her closed door, her parents bickered. Their argument was inaudible - at least, it was to Sergei. It stopped suddenly, and the parents entered the room. The father came first, the mother hiding behind him. What glimpse Sergei caught of her made it obvious she'd been crying.
"Hey, Dani." The father said softly, sitting down on the bed. Dani scooted across and buried her face in his chest. "Shh... It's okay. We're here."
"Daddy! What are they doing!?" She moaned, crying more.
"That doesn't matter. It'll be over soon."
Something in the father's voice sounded off. This wasn't loving reassurance anymore. It was a cold promise.
"Lie down, sweetie. Mommy will sing you a lullaby."
Dani lay down agreeably enough. Her father pulled the covers up to her neck.
"Close your eyes." Dad asked. Dani did. Sergei saw darkness, then suddenly was unable to breathe. The child opened her eyes and was instantly in pain thanks to fabric rubbing over them. She screamed, but a pillow drowned out the sound of her voice.
Every suck of air was a battle, and this battle was on the verge of ending. Fighting turned to slumping, the rush of thoughts turned to light-headedness. For a moment, the pillow was lifted a little, as if the assailant was having hesitations.
"Finish what you started!" Dani heard her mother snarl. In her bitter tone, one could pick up pain and love.
Pressure came back, but it was hard to feel anything anymore. Darkness closed over Dani's vision, even though it was reduced already.
***
As Dani slipped out of consciousness, Sergei slipped into it. He gasped, toppling over and landing in a doll house which smashed upon impact from the heavyset Russian. Sprawling in the bits of plastic, he grabbed his neck, wheezing.
Then the effects lifted and Sergei took a deep breath. It felt sweet, despite the dust floating around inside the room. He stayed there, on the floor, recovering from the latest psychotic episode.
Ever since Sergei was a young man, he could see the final moments of the deceased. The amount of time he could actually look at varied from person to person and the significance of the events that happened prior to their death. He had no idea what triggered this psychic ability in him, and he treated it more as a curse than a blessing.
The thing that made the visions worse was the experience that came with them. Sergei would feel the pain the corpse had felt. His lungs would be filled with liquid or deprived of air, his skin would feel like it was on fire or his organs would burn inside him.
But he wanted to see. Call it common curiosity or some sick perversion, but Sergei was drawn to seeing those last few moments of a person's life.
After calming down a bit, Sergei dragged himself up. His head was still spinning when he reached out to cover the little girl again and retraced his steps to the hallway, shutting the door. To his left was another door - this one left ajar by its occupants. Sergei already knew what was behind it, but he walked forward either way.
The creak of rusted hinges was made audible as the door gave way under a light push from the Russian. Inside, the room was tidy, bar a few smashed pieces of decoration. On the bed lay two more corpses - these were adults. Their arms were draped around one another, and an empty pill bottle lay at the foot of the bed. Sergei didn't need to find out their last moments.
After leaving the apartment, Sergei resumed his perilous journey down the staircase. The concrete reinforcements were more prominent as he got lower down, so there was less need to be careful.
The feeling of solid ground put Sergei in a state of false security. He got to the end of the staircase on the first floor, where the stairs themselves had crumbled. Looking back, the Russian did recall hearing a large crash during the night, but had assumed that it was just a grenade going off somewhere in the distance.
Now he was faced with the decision to either stay in the apartment building or leave. The latter was the obvious choice. But the real mistake was assuming that the floor would take the weight of him and his equipment combined.
Sergei braced himself, then dropped. A moment of weightlessness was about him, and then he hit the floor. All was well, he thought, then heard a gut-wrenching crumble beneath him. The concrete gave way, letting Sergei's legs fall through the floor, while his hands grasped for anything solid he could find. As luck would have it, there was a lump of rebar just within reach, an iron rod sticking out of it like a sword.
Sergei's hand locked around the lump, and for one intense moment he thought he felt it slide. It held, though, and he held onto it.
As the adrenaline left him, Sergei became aware of the pain flaring in his stomach. He'd hit the edge of the chasm with quite a lot of force due to the backpack weighing him down - all the Kevlar padding did was protect him from being sliced to bits by the sharp prongs of rusty metal surrounding the edge of the hole like rows of teeth.
As precarious and uncomfortable at this position was, it happened to be better than falling into the hole outright. Sergei struggled for a moment, and his erratic movement dislodged another large chunk of concrete. It fell for about a second, landing with a reverberating thud. What followed returned Sergei's sense of urgency to full capacity.
Down in the hole, a something squealed.
No time to think about what made that noise. Ignoring the prodding pain on his abdomen, the Russian dragged himself out, baring his teeth and straining his muscles. It was when he finally got his upper body on the ground that he felt something catch his boot. A futile attempt at kicking it off took place before the creature climbed up on his back and slashed at him with claws that looked deformed.
The first three attacks went without success. Then the fourth hit the strap of Sergei's backpack, slicing apart the entire right side and making the bag flop to one side with the creature. It sprawled in the dirt, momentarily pinned under the weight of Sergei's salvage. Taking this as a valid opportunity, Sergei raised one leg and planted his knee into the concrete away from the hole. As soon as he had a decent grip, he did a roll to his side and was free.
That feeling of freedom was short-lived, however. As soon as Sergei was on his back, the creature pounced on his chest, screeching in delight and attempting to rip his face off. Now he saw that it was a Crawler. A heavily deformed mutant, about the side of a small child, with ashen skin and blue veins showing all over it. The Crawler's eyes were of different sizes - one about the size of a golf ball and the other about the size of a large marble. It had teeth like little razors, with some resemblance to those of a human. Its legs were thin and bony, and the claws at the end of them looked exactly like small sickles, the blunt end more flattened to allow the Crawler to move. What really made them scary, though, was their similarity to human children.
"Cyotr!" He shouted, throwing an instinctive right hook at the creature. It connected with the Crawler's head, making its eyes roll around in their sockets. Another opportunity opened up. Taking hold of the Crawler's torso, Sergei lifted it up and threw it back at the hole.
The move was perfect. But, again, life decided to screw the Russian over.
On its way down, the Crawler's one blunt claw hooked on a loose strap of Sergei's backpack. The mutant sprawled again, its leg claws flailing. A cut went through the strap holding Sergei to his backpack. Before he could even react, the Crawler fell, dragging the backpack along down into the dark depths.
Sergei sat there, his mouth hanging open. He was too astonished to even begin to react with anger.
What the hell? He thought, running over the events in his head. It was the only thing he could do, bar mumbling in a squeaky tone. All of his belongings were in there. All of the food, water, equipment and spare clothing he had gathered.
That backpack was his life.
Yanking a flashlight from his belt, he crawled to the edge of the hole and flicked the switch. The beam it produced glared down into the darkness, illuminating the large blue and black hiker's bag. For just a moment, a flicker of hope appeared, then drowned out when more Crawlers threw themselves upon the intruder and mauled it, eating the rations and spilling the precious clean water.
Sergei slumped backwards and turned off the light to prevent the attraction of unnecessary attention. He shrugged off the loss, since there'd be no benefit from crying over it, and counted his remaining equipment.
A flashlight, whose battery level he couldn't check. His nine-millimetre Beretta M9 handgun, magazine empty. Two combat knives - one in his belt, the other in his boot. The machete strapped across the back of his belt. An L86 with six rounds and a bayonet. His high-tech gauntlet, which provided at least some reassurance towards knowing where he was.
And an old Mars bar in his pocket. It seemed pathetic to be stuck with a bit of chocolate for sustenance, but then again, it was better than nothing.
Standing, Sergei walked to his rifle, having dropped it when he fell. The darkness outside clung to everything, shadows moving under its vast veil. Taking a deep breath, Sergei slung the rifle over his shoulder and drew his machete.
In the heavy, thick air of post-apocalyptic England, Sergei Demitreyev became one of those shadows.