Sister climbed up onto the roof of the truck, using the scope of her sniper rifle as a telescope. After a moment, she jumped lightly down, telling us there was a Meatbeast a short way up the road, off to one side, which we promptly drove towards as we were running low on food once more.
Sure enough, a short way down a gravel path lay a large, heavily mutated former cow. I sliced off a few nice steaks for our breakfast, which Apocalypse Girl cooked for us. We devoured our fresh, hot breakfast with gusto and glee, then I carved off a lot more for later.
noon
We came to another one of those tiny outback towns around lunchtime. The really strange thing about this place was that it seemed totally unaffected by anything that had happened to the rest of the world over the last five or so months. There were no people around, true, but it looked easily like they could all just be inside. We had to investigate further.
Sonny suggested that we go in pairs, though I shook my head. I wanted us to stick together. I still didn't know what Sonny was capable of, not really, nor did I want him running off alone with Sister. He might try something and get shot for his troubles. Or they might both get eaten while otherwise occupied. Neither option appealed much.
We filled up our truck and empty fuel canisters at the local service station first, loading them up into the back and making sure they were secure, then we raided the fridges. There was not a lot left, just a solitary unopened bottle of water. It was not really much of a concern, we still had plenty of water in the truck.
After this, we went around the town, searching each building in turn. Everybody's personal belongings were gone. The furniture still stood, sure, the wardrobes still contained clothes. The family photos were all gone, however, as well as music and movie collections, anything that might have held personal value was gone. In the window of the local post office was a painted message reading, simply, 'Gone to Coober safer there'.
It looked as if everyone had left at the very beginning, deciding that the larger mining town was a better idea, the age-old idea of safety in numbers. I found myself hoping that they were all still there, safe and sound in houses in the ground.
evening
There was little else to do in the town, so we moved on. The road was clear of obstructions, clear of Dead, too and we made good time. We made nearly a hundred kilometres before it grew too dark to comfortably drive. At that point we pulled over, the four of us climbing in the back, munching on some cold pre-cooked Meat-beast steaks.
The howling shriek we had heard the other night sounded once more, making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. It was louder this time, closer. More menacing. Apocalypse Girl huddled into me as it sounded once more, closer again, though from a different direction, this time. Another shriek-howl came, this one sounding like it was almost on top of us. Tensing, reaching for our weapons, we waited.
Nothing came. After a few more minutes, the trio of shriek-howling critters, whatever they were, had moved on. Their disconcerting noises kept us awake as long as we could hear them, meaning, in this particular case, half the fucking night. Then, Apocalypse Girl and I took watch.
“
It doesn't seem as Cold tonight, somehow,” She told me, once we were atop the roof of the truck. The sudden noise of her words made me jump. “Or else maybe I'm just getting used to it. Hard to imagine getting used to anything in this fucked up world we live in now.” Her hand found mine in the dark. “Except, maybe, for one or two things.” She placed my hand on her stomach. “I am getting so fucking sick and tired of always being on the move, though,” She said with a slight smile.
“
It won't be long until we're at the Alice Springs Facility,” I assured her. “That should be safe, at least.” I stroked her cheek with my spare hand.
“
As long as nobody is using it to create abominations, or some psycho isn't using it to launch raids on poor, unsuspecting travellers, or it's full of Dead, or any number of other things could go wrong with this place.” Before I could say anything, she held up her hand. “I know! I know, alright? I just, I don't know, needed to have a bit of a rant, I suppose. Not everything that's happened since the world went to shit has been bad. I have to remember that sometimes.”
May 23rdYear 1 A.Z.
morning
Overnight, more snow fell, dusting the world once more in a light film of grey. It was only a small amount, thus far, maybe half a centimetre deep, so we set up a cooking fire and started the day with a hot breakfast of Meatbeast steaks. Keeping watch was easier when the snow was not so deep. Seeing no trace of the Dead, we piled up on into the truck and began our trek to Coober Pedy.
We were able to make relatively good time on the road, despite the snow. Sister was driving, Sonny sitting beside her, being her spare pair of eyes. One set was not enough, we had discovered over the last couple of months. A lone driver could easily miss something halfburied by the snow, or not notice a mob of Dead ones approaching. Even with a map, as well, it was difficult to see the right turn-off due to snow.
As it was, though, we were following the road we needed. Sonny pointed out that this one led, not only to Coober Pedy, but Alice Springs as well, eventually. As we moved on down the road, we found and promptly ran down a couple of straggling shamblers, thinking that we were likely doing the town of Coober Pedy a small favour with each Dead we killed.
noon
Fucking typical. Another traffic snarl, this one bad enough that it covered the entire road for a fair distance. Twenty or more vehicles of various types littered the roadway, mostly family cars, a few Utes, a VW combi-van that evoked longing for our unfortunately dead Nightmare. Telling Sonny to stay with the truck, Sister, Apocalypse Girl and I jumped out and began the tedious, time-consuming task of shifting cars, searching them for any supplies as we went.
Naturally, the combi-van was full of Dead university students, who had been travelling up north for the summer, though why anybody would willingly subject themselves to the torture of a fucking
desert
in the middle of an Australian summer quite frankly baffled the shit out of me. My sword and Apocalypse Girl's frypan took care of those in the back quickly enough, while Sister took to the seat-belted trio up front with a crowbar before we began piling the carcasses on the side of the road. After the combi-van was clear, we moved on to each car in turn, making sure we removed the threat of the Dead before we even began searching. If nothing else, we found a lot of new, spare clothes. All designed for summer, of course, so lots of shorts and t-shirts. No weapons, save a small caliber rifle in the back of a Ute that had been so badly fucked up by rain and snow that it was now a worthless piece of rusted metal and rotted wood. Probably used to hunt kangaroos, originally. The smaller grey variety, of course, a big red roo would probably require something with a little more kick.
Loading up the clothing into the back of our truck, we began trying to move some of these vehicles off the road. The combi-van proved among the easiest to shift, actually, despite its bulk. Others had their hand-brakes permanently on, or ridiculously flat tyres, or were fused together by collisions. Eventually we were forced to employ the truck to move some of them and, in time, the road was clear enough for travel.
evening
There were lights on the horizon ahead of us. Figuring that rocking up in the dead of night might be taken the wrong way, we decided to wait until morning before we approached too close, but it appeared that we had finally found Coober Pedy at long last. To tell the truth, I have always wanted to see one of their underground houses. We drove towards the lights, staying at least a kilometre away, for their safety and our own. The last thing we needed was to get into a gunfight with an entire town. The shriek-howls that we had heard before started up again, this time seeming to come from all directions at once. Rather than post a lookout on top of the truck, we figured it was best to just hole up in the back.
Sonny was anxious to get to town, as were we all, but the strange animal noises coming from without had us all worried. We had seen some of the mutated critters that populated the outback now, some of which were useful, but most seemed simply deadly. The Drop-Bear, for instance, that had eviscerated poor Granny. They seemed to be more of a silent predator, dropping on their prey from above, but whatever was making those shriek-howl noises sounded more like a hunter, using terror to drive their prey before them. They also sounded
big
.
May 24thYear 1 A.Z.
morning
The morning seemed to never come, but as the complete black of night regressed to a dull grey whatever had been making those horrible noises all fucking night finally left. The sounds themselves will probably haunt our nightmares for years to come. Deciding as soon as we were sure they were gone we continued on to Coober Pedy.
All my life I had heard of the town, the unusual underground houses that people lived in. I had always imagined a sort of desert version of The Shire. Well, now it was an underground town no longer. They had cannibalised what they could of the exterior, above ground portion of their housing, creating a nest for themselves that hung from an enormous crane, supported by as much various assorted crap, building materials, boulders, mining equipment, whatever they could build the gigantic pillar that held the Coober's Nest aloft.
A three metre high fence of assorted, re-purposed metal surrounded the town, which itself was about four metres up. Apocalypse Girl drove the truck up to the base of the tower of junk, honking the horn a couple of time, in case nobody had noticed us yet.
A crossbow bolt skittered off of the bonnet of the truck. A voice somewhat distorted came from a megaphone wielded by a man standing next to the crossbowman. He ordered us to come out of the truck, hands above our heads and he would send down a bucket for our weapons, then a ladder for us. Sister shouted back, asking what guarantee we had that we'd get them back. The man replied that we had no guarantee whatsoever, but we'd be better off trusting him than whatever else is out there.
We had no choice but to agree.
noon
We climbed up the rope ladder that they lowered for us. Seeing our guns still in their bucket as we arrived at the top made being greeted at gunpoint a little less irritating. “I apologise,” said a thick, Irish accented voice coming from behind a ginger beard. “But, for now, we'll be keeping these. We'll give 'em back to you, soon as we're sure you're good people, but for now I need you to go unarmed.”
He motioned for us to hand over our melee weapons as well, raising an eyebrow as Apocalypse Girl handed over The Frypan with a glare. I handed over my katana to Ginger myself, telling him to look after it for me. To my surprise, the man nodded, saying that he would. Coober's Nest was actually quite a bit larger than it had seemed from below. There were several 'rooms' partitioned off from the main communal area, with a sizeable and sturdy walkway around the exterior. The rooms were well furnished and well insulated against the Cold, layers of blankets nailed in place over the walls. More blankets served as doors.
Ginger showed us around, introducing us to some of the locals, Dentist, who was in charge of all things medically related and Scout. She was an interesting one. Dentist shook our hands enthusiastically, smiling broadly. Scout simply raised an eyebrow. Then she told us that we were the first group to have made it through alive, as though discussing the weather. Then, she went back to cleaning her rifle.
Taking us to a room where we could get settled, Ginger left with a smile on his face. They had pulled together a few spare mattresses that Apocalypse Girl curled up on almost immediately. There was also a couch that Sonny and Sister sat on together. I felt ill-at-ease without my sword, so I paced back and forth, impatiently.
evening
We had been left more-or-less alone for most of the afternoon, though a couple of smaller heads had poked through the curtain briefly. They fled as soon as Apocalypse Girl said hello and from without we heard their mother berating them for going so near 'the strangers' in case we were dangerous. The smile on Apocalypse Girl's face dropped once she heard that.
Scout came for us shortly after full dark. “Dinner.” was all she said. We followed her into the communal area at the centre of Coober's Nest where a woman in a chef's hat was passing out bowls of stew. There were a good thirty people in this room alone. Most, if not all, of the town's remaining inhabitants.
Chef handed Apocalypse Girl a bowl first, who sniffed at it, asking what the meat was. Chef smiled, telling us it was lamb, they still had plenty of different meat left. The Nest had gone up early, Ginger even going so far as to install generators into the suspended town. The ability to freeze huge amounts of food was the second thing that the Irishman had considered.
We ate with them, the meal being the best thing we had tasted since the early days back at The Think Tank. Around a mouthful of fresh-baked bread, Ginger asked us how we had managed to make our way this far north. We told him the truth, that we were simply passing through on our way to Alice Springs because we had an idea that there was a hidden underground bunker somewhere in that general area.
“
Yeah? Good luck with that!” Scout's sarcastic tone assaulted us. “You would have heard them, the last few nights, as you got closer to Coober, yeah? Those horrific, nasty noises?” We all nodded, slowly. “Come with me.” As if on cue, a piercing shriek-howl erupted from just outside, startling the buggery out of us all.
The best below us was
massive
. Muscles rippled along its hide, threatening to burst through the skin. Sensing prey it stood up on its hind legs, walking over to the fence. The fucking thing was barely half a metre shorter than the wall of detritus. “Dingoes, mate. Fucking Dingoes.” Scout spat at the thing. Waving over the guard that had shot at our truck earlier this morning, she took his crossbow from him, lining up the beast in her sights. The bolt flowered from the Dingo's skull. It hardly even noticed. It just cackled its shrieking howling call from between razor sharp teeth. Asking to borrow Scout's binoculars I got a better look at the thing. Spines erupted from the creature's back and the tail had lengthened, becoming a whip that seemed to cut the air. It looked sharp as a steel blade. If packs of those wandered the grey wastes, getting to Alice Springs would be painful. I said as much. “There's worse than Dingoes out there, believe me.” Scout warned us. Fuck.