Party at the End of the World

Here’s my short story that did not make it into

Raconteur Press

anthology Mad Science!.

So I’m just publishing it here. Enjoy.

++++

The party is about to reach its climax. We’re properly liquored up – I and Yoko could sober up in seconds if necessary – and Oboe climbs on the stage to make his announcement. He’s wearing his trademark black hyperfit bermudas and an unbuttoned batik shirt in tones of blue; he’s jacked and tanned as usual; he carries a Walther P38 replica in a holster integrated in the bermudas. Of course the gun prints like crazy, but that’s a fashion statement too.

MC Killabong has gone offstage, probably to vape more ganja, and DJ Gigi Guetta at the back is playing some bland ambient tecno at low volume, for once. Oboe drains his gin tonic and throws the highball glass to the floor in his classic move. The polymer glass just bounces off; some cleaning bot will pick it up.

I take a sip of my whiskey on the rocks: it is damn fine stuff. When Oboe is involved, booze is plentiful and of the highest quality. Yoko is savoring a saison blonde and she looks splendid as usual in her moderately daring jade green bikini and unbuttoned, white silk dress shirt. To complete her look, she’s also wearing water shoes in the same green as her bikini and her Kuro Inazuma katana hanging from a traditional sword belt.

I am the most gruff and unfashionable of the lot. Black hiking sandals, desert camo bermudas, unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt and dual tiger-striped Desert Eagle in shoulder rigs. .50 AE caliber, of course. We’re standing by one of the bars, at the edge of the main dance pit; we’re here to enjoy ourselves, but our tactical instincts never sleep. The other guests sport a collection of more or less minimal speedos and swimsuits; shirts and tank tops, heels and barefoot shoes. I can spot small handguns and knives here and there in more or less appropriate holsters. Everybody’s tanned and toned and many had tasteful plastic surgeries… or genetic enhancements, even. And they’re drinking buckets of booze on the beach in a warm summer night. That’s the crowd that rolls with Oboe.

“All of you! Yes, all! You are making this party the best!”, Oboe booms into a hand-held mic

The crowd reply with a thunderous, intoxicated cheer.

“Now, without beating around the bush, I introduce you Dr Frank and Dr Stein of Zombacorp! Now you might think those are made up names… what are the chances of Frank and Stein meeting up in real life, after all?”

Unintelligible approval sounds from the crowd.

“But I assure you, they are real! They met in high school, in biology class no less! And they knew their fate was sealed from that moment! All welcome Frank and Stein!”

Another loud cheer and a forest of glasses held high.

Gigi Guetta starts with a scratch and plays some simplistic anthemic dance piece with lyrics that go: “Mad, mad, mad scientist!” while a raised self-propelled platform rolls out on stage. Frank and Stein stand behind DJ-like consoles. They look exactly as you’d imagine them: nerds low on fitness and sun exposure trying to fit in with the surfing jocks.

They pump their fists in the air while stage lights do their number and the anthem slowly fades to silence.

“Are You ready Frank?”

“Are you ready Stein?”

“Then let’s GOOO!”, they end at the unison. It could have been cringe as hell, but in fact they manage to make it look half cool.

GGG spins an ominous keyboard tune and the two mad scientists on stage begin activating their gear. Yeah, they play it out like a show. Stein is clearly the leader of the duo.

“Tesla turbocoil?”

“Charged!”

“Weather control drones?”

“Green!”

“Positron irradiator?”

“Armed!”

“Nanobots swarm?”

“On standby!”

“5G controller, activated!”

A holographic display appears over them. It shows a 3D rendering of the bay and a number of diagrams, dials and switches.

Man, they’re really leaning into it. I exchange a glance with Yoko.

“Fuckin’ rad!”

She smiles, but she’s on edge too.

“RELEASE THE SWARM!”

A sort of thin cloud appears on the display over the Tesla barge location.

“TURBOCOIL, FIRE!”

And now, a column of blinding white plasma rises from the barge shooting up into the sky. That blast is strong enough to produce an EMP that’s going to mess with commercial grade electronics. The dark nanobot mist starts spinning around it, slow at first but accelerating steadily until it forms a veritable funnel-shaped whirlwind and the plasma shuts off. Another dark cloud, this one natural… well, made of water droplets, alright – forms above the funnel and begins spinning and funneling downwards too, until it joins the nanobot funnel. The whole thing turns the whitish gray of a waterspout; a stiff breeze hits the beach and makes shirts and dresses billow in the air. But Frank & Stein keep going.

“Funnel stable and under control!”

“OPEN THE SHARK TANK! IRRADIATE!

A faint green glow blooms over the Marine Genetic Research Center to the south-east.

“GO FOR SUCTION!”

Franks works the controls on his console and the waterspout just moves… at first in fits and starts, but more and more steadily in time. I’ve seen battleships and blah blah, but this is pretty damn cool too. The waterspout is heading towards the faint radioactive glow. The crowd realized what’s going on and now they chant in encouragement.

Yoko rolls her eyes:

“They are gonna do it.”

“Yes, they are.”

And they do. The funnel reaches the shark tank and begins glowing faintly. Little shapes in fluo-green color get sucked up into the waterspout and spin around in the violent winds. But it ain’t over yet, oh no.

“Ready Frank? MAXIMUM POWER!”

“Yeah Stein, MAX POWAAHHH!”

The funnel grows bigger and the winds spin faster… until a huge, glowing shape lifts off too and rises rotating with the whirlwind.

“Holy cow, that’s the meg! These crazy fuckers lifted it!”

“Did you ever doubt that Oboe could accomplish another extravagant act of pointless and reckless madness?”, Yoko ponders.

“No, never.”

The crowd is going crazy with wonder and GGG pumps some triumphal tune with ludicrous bass drum.

“Prepare for flyby!”, Stein orders.

Frank steers carefully the waterspout towards the beach. That’s what they meant with flyby then… I wonder how close these nutcases will dare to take it. I scan once again the area: Oboe’s fortified beach villa is on the other side of the dance floor. If shit hits the fan, that area will be full of panicked people. Behind the bar, a short distance away, there’s a tangle of sand dunes. That’s a better escape route. I and Yoko don’t have to worry so much about a tornado with our strong and resilient cyberbodies. Still, being caught out there in the open is no fun.

The tornado is pretty damn close now, about three hundred meters out to sea. Now all can see the green-glowing sharks dancing like confetti in the wind … and the megalodon floating in the midst of the sabbath. Fucking hell, Oboe and his gang are batshit insane, but they can get stuff done.

I turn my eyes to the stage, and I see signs of nervousness. Frank looks… well, frantic at the controls.

“Keep the distance Frank.”, Stein advises in the mic.

Frank mouths something with his mike off. ‘… sub-swarms offline’, I can read on his lips. That doesn’t sound good. The funnel is kinda shaking now, and it lost its straight, regular shape. It’s bending and its base inches forward towards the beach. Fuck.

Orange, then red warning light begin flashing on the holo display. Stein shuts it down, and goes ashen. Frank looks pale and stunned too.

“Funnel control lost…”, he mutters toneless and remains frozen in place.

But stein keeps it together enough. I can see him slam his hand down on an emergency mushroom switch:

“Evacuate the beach! Evacuate! Evacuate! The… sha… tornado is coming! Take cover!”

And yeah, coming it is. The wind is strong enough now to overturn tables; the lights and speakers rigging over the stage is swaying a bit too much for comfort. GGG starts packing his gear back into a fly-case… then gives up; he only takes the center console and hits the road.

Now it’s time to assess priorities. While a… probably bull shark lands with a wet thud on the sand a few meters away. It wiggles forward aiming for a young bloke that’s too paralyzed with terror to move. I and Yoko are not there to look after anyone in particular, so our first priority is to keep ourselves safe and sound. Second priority, rescue eventual people in need. Scratch the “eventual”.

<Stein ran, Frank is in shock. I’ll get him.>, Yoko says on our private channel.

<Understood.>. A pained scream attracts my attention: <Looks like I’ve got my hands full too.>

Yoko is already leaping faster and more agile than any mere human through the panicked crowd. Scattered glowing sharks begin raining down from the sky. Yeah, radioactive sharks are raining down from the sky. There’s never a boring day with Oboe.

It’s the bloke from a second ago. The bull shark is chewing on his leg. Which is in fact preventing the bloke from flying away in the fierce winds… but it doesn’t make any fucking sense: the shark should be dead for the impact. Unless… shit, this is ZOMBAcorp we’re talking about.

<Heads up Yoko, we’re dealing with ZOMBIE sharks here.>

I jump forward pulling out the left Desert Eagle and I shoot the shark right behind the eye, a point-blank double-tap. It goes limp, but damn…

Yoko reaches my side. She’s still helping Frank walk around, but he’s better now. Something like a table leg comes flying at them, but Yoko just swats it away. More sharks of all types rain down around us. A great white smashes the stage and bites into some girl that took cover under the planks. I hail Oboe on a private channel:

“Oboe, this is Lemmy. What the fuck man, zombie sharks??”

“Live sharks could not survive in the waterspout. The zombification is only temporary tho… 12 hours. The tornado too cannot last much lunger without the nanobot enhancement. A few more minutes maybe.”

“Great fucking news.”

A tornado can rip up a whole town in a few minutes. Not counting the zombie sharks that will stay zombie for several more hours.

“I’ll see you on the other side, Lemmy. Oboe out.”

While talking, I pried open the bull shark’s jaws. The bloke has got a nasty wound, but the bone is not broken. A little chipped only.

“What’s your name mate?”

“Yamori.”

“It will hurt like fuck, Yamori, but you’ll make it. Stick with me.”

“To the dunes! We’re too exposed here!”, I tell the others.

We half-walk, half-crawl towards the dunes; I and Yoko still have to help the other two men and try shielding them from the worst of the elements. The wind is deafening and the sand it carries makes me nearly blind while acting like almost sandpaper. Other debris hit my body and tear apart my clothes. It is damn slow going.

Something bigger, wet and squiggly bumps hard into me and nearly knocks us over. Another bloody shark… probably a reef shark. Also this one is trying to bite into anything within reach, but I take care of it with a single shot. These damn hand cannons have a pitiful magazine capacity, and I brought only one spare mag per gun. Why I carry them, you may ask then. They’re show guns; I carry them because I’ve got an image to preserve.

We manage to advance about half of the distance to the dunes, when Yoko goes:

“Incoming! At our six!”

I turn around and… fucking hell, it’s a great white, glowing green and barreling right at us jaws open wide. Shooting it would be useless; I sprint to the side dragging my charge with me. Yoko does the same towards the other side, and a moment later the great white smashes into the ground biting sand. That was close.

Then… the great white splits in half just behind the dorsal fin and through the gap I can see Yoko delivering the final blow with her sword. Her shirt is filthy and in tatters but she looks unperturbed looking at the pieces of shark, and then cleaning the black katana on a piece of her useless shirt.

The wind seems to be subsiding at this point, but it’s still damn strong and assorted debris keep falling around us. I feel, more than hear, a big PLOP!, a pressure wave like something really large but soft falling to the ground. I’ve got a suspicion.

We push hard for the final sprint to the dunes. Yamori is panting and cussing the whole time but he keeps going. We reach the dunes and drop our charges in the relative safety of the crevices: the wind is much weaker down there.

“I never thought I’d see a hail of radioactive zombie sharks. I mean, a shark rain happened a few times before… but not with all the bells and whistles this one’s got.”

Nobody is in the mood for conversation, damn. The wind is dying down fast and I begin hearing screams of rage and pain and horror. Without using spectral filtering and all that I mean. Small-caliber gunshots also pop off in the distance. We’ll join the party soon, but first I administer first aid to Yamori: a slathering of wound gel and a bandage. I do carry a kit, not for myself but for others. No other survivors are coming this way it seems.

Yoko leaps to the top of a dune:

“The megalodon landed on the beach. It’s still undead.”

I squat closer to Frank’s face:

“You made these fucking zombie sharks. Do they have a safety killswitch? An antidote? A selective poison?”

“No… what do we need all hat for?”, he replies genuinely puzzled.

“Because you’re massive… ah sod it, there’s no point now.”

We make sure that Frank and Yamori can manage on their own, then I draw my Desert Eagles and Yoko draws her katana. It’s boogaloo time.

We walk over the dune with a straightforward mission: make all undead sharks positively dead. But man, it’s gonna take a lot of work: a good stretch of the beach is almost covered in glowing sharkey shapes. The huge megalodon sits just uphill of the surf with its tail in the water. Some survivors are shooting and stabbing at the huge beast, but it just shrugs all that off. A guy in orange fluo speedo – I remember him from before, he was the wildest dancer – approaches the meg from the tail with a lasso in his hands. The bigass shark flicks its tail and sends the poor sod flying through the air to land with a bone crunch in a pose that’s hardly compatible with human life. Brave but stupid.

“I don’t have much ammo, you’ll have to do the heavy lifting”, I admit to Yoko.

We do have a precision rifle in the offroader, but even that doesn’t have enough ammo to make a real difference. This was supposed to be a party, not a mission: that’s why we came carrying the bare minimum.

She nods. “The priority is to do the job.”

Oboe hails me on the radio:

“Lemmy, a recovery team from the research center is on its way. Spare as many sharks as possible.”

“Are you for real? These bastards are still biting people!”

And as I say that, somehow a naked girl ends up with her arm in a hammerhead’s mouth while her… twin possibly, they look identical, bashes it upside the head with a parasol pole.

“Spare the ones that are not an immediate danger to people, alright. Those are valuable corporate assets.”

I groan. “No danger according to MY judgment.”

“Deal.”

“That was Oboe. He wants to preserve the sharks: they’re corporate assets. I told him we decide which ones are an immediate danger to people.”

“He is a real mad scientist.”, Yoko quips with a hint of dissatisfaction, “Il’ll go northwest.”

“We’ll meet back here when we’re done.”

Yoko leaves with purposeful strides. She comes across the twin girls and the hammerhead first, and almost casually she chops off the shark’s head.

I can’t be outdone. I locate a thresher shark threshing like mad partly buried under a pile of debris. Weren’t zombies supposed to be slow tho? Whatever, I shoot the thing in the head: thresing like that IS a danger.

But I should get a bladed weapon to save ammo. I scan the sand covered in debris, bits of clothing and what looks suspiciously like human or shark remains, searching for something. And I find it: a cheap-ass, mean-looking but altogether shit survival knife with about twenty five centimeters of blade. It will do for this occasion.

***

The knife broke pretty soon, as I thought, and I’m left with only one round in a Desert Eagle.

Because of course there was another fuck in the cluster: some of the humans bitten by sharks turned into zombies too, and we had to take care those as well. Franks took refuge in the villa with Oboe and assured us the zombification is only temporary. So I and Yoko tried our best to capture the human zombies and not terminate them. Without the proper equipment for the job, we resorted to bits and pieces of torn fabric, electrical cords, stage ropes and whatnot.

For the moment I ignore the zombie meg that keeps biting the air behind me. That bastard has been shot, stabbed, set on fire with a vodka Molotov cocktail, and had its tail cut off.. and yet it keeps slithering forward on the blood-soaked sand one inch at a time towards me.

But that’s a minor issue at the moment. I know a surprise is coming, like a hand grabbing you by the ankle in a horror movie. That’s why I wanna keep a .50 AE pill ready to treat certain diseases.

And indeed, on time like the fake ending of a bad horror movie, here it comes. I see a faintly glowing shape under the water, then a giant manta ray jumps out of the sea and glides towards me holding its tail spike ready to strike. But I’m ready and plant a frag bullet right in that sea kite’s cephalic lobe. Then I jump rolling to my right, because a bullet ain’t enough to stop a couple hundred kilos of manta ray flying at speed. The beast smashes into the ground, cartwheels and finally stays down. It was about goddamn time. I holster my gun after checking the chamber.

<I’m done here. It was a hell of a job.>, Yoko says on the direct channel.

<The meg is still undead. We gotta finish it off.>

<Understood, I’m coming over.>

Yoko appears from behind the dark stone groin. She’s topless in public… which is something she almost never does; covered head to toe in sand, gore and grime and she’s wiping her sword in a piece of filthy cloth. She’s sexy as hell too.

“I took care of the human zombies. I had to use my bikini top to tie down the last one.”

That explains it.

“We still have got the meg. Can I borrow your blade?”

She presents me the handle of the katana:

“It’s all yours.”

Then she watches in amusement while I attack the beast at the gills level as it were a tree. I chop off slices and wedges of flesh and bone… no, cartilage, until I reach the shark’s spine and severe it. At last even the meg stops flapping about.

I am not in the best shape either. Another great white got me so bad to damage my cyber leg with its bite. I am covered in grime and ichor; I lost my shirt and my bermudas are in tatters. Fuck.

***

I give the katana back to Yoko and we walk together across the dance floor towards the villa. In the early morning light we don’t need night vision to see the sand is littered with all sorts of detritus, empty bottles whole and broken, and human remains. There’s even a clear rubber vibrator with disco lights in it. Its battery is dying; the light and vibration are getting weaker by the second. It belonged to Janet the pole dancer; now what’s left of Janet is inside the megalodon. Hell if I know how her toy got there.

We find MC Killabong too. He’s dead, impaled by a flying 2x4 inside his truck. Behind the truck he was towing a lemon shark tied to a piece of rope. His car stereo is still playing his most famous track Kill or Die. How fitting, motherfucker.

The sun is rising from behind the ragged mountains. The sun beams dissolve the night’s haze and darkness and bring light to push away the horror. How many dawns I have seen in the mountains when I was a soldier… usually after a nigh spent smoking enemies.

I stop a few seconds to reminisce, but Yoko isn’t very poetic:

“We have taken a significant dose of radiations. It’s innocuous for me, but your organic brain needs decontamination to remain safe. We have a decontamination kit in the offroader.”

“Right. At least I’ll have a nice trip home.”

The treatment has got a curious side effect: it sends you tripping balls. But I don’t mind.

The villa is built like a bloody concrete fortress and survived the tornado pretty much unscathed. A couple of sharks got stuck in the window steel grates and now they keep flapping their tails in the air while dark blood trickles down the wall.

Oboe and his bleached-blonde – surely bleached, because she’s of Batak descent – hottie of the month walk nonchalantly out of the front door to welcome us. He’s got a score of kids too from a score of hotties.

I swear, those two nutcases are showered and perfumed, clothes in perfect order, skin well hydrated and hair done properly. He’s holding a beer can while she prefers a large glass of a pinkish drink. Likely, rum and grapefruit, knowing the character.

“Lemmy! Yoko! That was a hell of a party! Truly the end of the world, eh! Radioactive zombie sharks raining down! The search and rescue teams will be here soon, and it’s gonna be a fascinating research.”

They don’t pay attention to the fact we’re half naked… but it’s not like Oboe and Ayu are very covered either. He’s wearing the same kind of hyperfit bermudas but this time in blue, and a tanktop of the same sort; Ayu prefers a halter hyperfit onepiece which reveals more than it covers. Her weapon is a small revolver enameled pink in a pectoral holster.

And they don’t care about the dead and maimed in this fucking radioactive zombie shark tornado. But we’ve gotten used to Oboe’s nonchalant madness. And it was one truly apocalyptic party, nobody can deny it.

“Yeah, we kicked some serious zombie sharks’ arses! A toast, Oboe?”

“Sure, comrades!”

He turns towards the villa, whistles and shouts:

“Max! Take some beers out here!”

Max, or Maximilian, is Obo’s nephew. He’s been put on catering and latrine corvee, and the first look is enough to understand why. He comes lugging a heavy portable refrigerator; he’s got shaggy and greasy dark curly hair; taupe, knee level-riding corduroy cargo pants, a black sweater with psychedelic prints and hood falling down to his nose. And of course a pair of ancient design skate shoes, unlaced and falling apart. In short, he looks like a pothead loser.

He’s shambling, stumbling over his own feet and mumbling cuss words, but he manages to bring us the beers without incident.

“Hell, uncle, I was tripping crazy! There was a twister full of zombie sharks! What a groovy ride!”

Max speaks with a heavy, almost guttural R. He barely realized we are all here.

“It was no trip. It happened for real.”; Oboe explains.

“Groovy!”, he retorts. Then he spots Yoko still half-naked: “Groovy tits!”

Yoko doesn’t take it too kindly, but neither too badly. With a couple strides she gets into the boy’s face, lifts his hoodie and stares him in the eyes… reduced to two reddened slits.

“That’s not a polite way to address a lady, do you know?”

“H… Sorry… madam.”

“You should be sorry. Who taught you manners?”

Yoko is just shaking him up a bit. If she wanted to hurt him, he’d be hurting for real already. I’m laughing my ass off inside, while I keep a cybernetic stoneface on the outside. Oboe is on the brink of rolling on the floor laughing too, while Ayu is searching inside her glass for the sense of life. I come up with an idea:

“You gotta pay penance, Max.”, I affirm, “Say, ‘Roast rabbit is rarely rated wrongly’.”

The boy looks dumbfounded.

Yoko flashes a wicked smile:

“You heard him, Max. ‘Roast rabbit is rarely rated wrongly’, come on.”

Max turns his gaze from Yoko to me, but he finds little sympathy in either. He turns to his uncle, but there’s even less sympathy there. He swallows nervously, then he starts:

“Rhoast rHabbit is rHarHHely HHated wHHHongly.”

If I weren’t a cyborg, I’d be laughing my ass off now. Hell, those R’s… it felt like his frikkin’ alveoli were about to take off from his lungs. Even Yoko is laughing hard on the private channel. Oboe instead is bent double splitting his sides. But not Ayu; she seems intent in proving how far her eyes can roll without tearing something. Man, some folks just cannot have fun.

Yoko pats Max on the shoulder, while he massages his throat and looks hopeful and a little embarrassed at us.

“That’s a good start!”

Max shows he’s not too damn baked after all: he takes off his sweater – showing a faded and full of holes green t-shirt with a maijuana leaf print on the front – and hands it to Yoko.

“Herhe madam, you can coverh up.”, he explains.

She graciously takes the sweater and dons it. Then she informs me:

<There are residues of ten different drugs on this sweater.>

<No kidding...>

Oboe came back from his fit of laughter. He goes:

“You know what was really GRAND? How you dealt with the tiger shark at the pedal boat station!. I did not think you could terminate it with a sword.”

My tactical instinct takes over:

“Mate, you were buttoned up in here the whole time. How do you know?”

“I’ve got my surveillance setup, Lemmy.”

“Tornado-resistant?”

“Of course.”

“Fair enough.”

“There was no better way to destroy the threat.”, Yoko explains as matter of fact, “I straddled the shark to gain access to its brain.”

“It was still one hell of a show!”

Yes, with her being topless and gripping onto the shark by sheer leg strength. Her POV video of the action would be a viral hit, but she’s too reserved to post it.

<At your six. Survivors approaching.>

I turn around, and with a minimum of zoom I can recognize the two characters shambling on the sand towards the villa. The woman is tall and stick-thin but dressed in a tight and sexy power suit; he’s short, stocky, proudly displays a receding hairline and never lets go of his black suit, white shirt and sunglasses. Fox and Dana, the Laurel and Hardy of Natursearch security.

His suit his shredded but his shades remain firm on his face. She is limping badly and they prop each other up.

“Hell, those two are bulletproof!”, I comment.

“Excellent agents despite their peculiarities. Natursearch will always be thankful.”, Oboe echoes.

But, we keep standing there to watch Fox and Dana inch forward. I want to know whether they’ll ask for help. No, they’d rather die. Within a few minutes, they reach us.

Ayu made herself useful and grabbed a first aid backpack from inside.

Dana throws a canvas sling bag to the ground.

“Electronic devices used to record the incident. I recommend to destroy them as soon as possible: they contain compromising evidence.”

And just then he collapses on the sand.

Fox has her own opinions too:

“Mr Oboe, I think it is obvious that taking an artificial… shark-tornado so close to the beach WAS a terrible idea.”

But Oboe remains rock steady:

“Accidents happen despite the best practices. We cannot lose our determination to go forward.”

And that’s why Oboe is officially banned from all the Terran Union and a number of other planets that want to keep up a semblance of civilization.

Fox opens her mouth to reply, then she gives up and sits next to Dana. She starts patting his wounds with a corner of her shirt, even while Ayu is treating him the proper way. She acts like someone well trained in first aid.

<They’re so romantic!>, I quip.

<Why you never pat my wounds?>

<We’re cyborgs, right? We got micro-machines to do repairs.>

<Correct.>

Cries arrive from the nearest dune. It’s a young woman’s voice, and it sounds a lot like Max.

“Maxi… help me Maxi. I’m all banged up.”

He looks surprised at first, then he connects enough brain cells:

“Hell, Emi! I’m rhunning, love!”. And he takes off towards the dune with a an awkward gait.

<I’ll follow the pothead, I wanna see that specimen.>, I inform Yoko.

I easily catch up with Max on the way to the voice. More moans and cries are coming from a shrub near the top of the dune.

“Is that your girlfriend?”

“Yeah.”

“Were you so fucking baked you forgot about her?”

“Hell, I was little stoned.”

We reach the shubbery. Yes, she is his female version, what a surprise.

“Come on Maxi, take me our of this brhierh, it smells like rhotten fish in herhe. It makes me sick!”

It’s not gonna be easy to pull her out. Her right hand is almost amputated, but somehow she managed to wrap a piece of fabric around the wound and stop the blood loss. Her left ankle instead is stuck between two small trunks and bent at a fucking unnatural angle. I wonder how she is not in agonizing pain, then I notice she’s holding a small bottle in the left hand, and every few second she takes a big snort from it.

A dead spotted dogfish half a meter away from her provides the rotten fish smell. She, I suppose, stuck a mango vodka bottle’s neck into the fish’s brain.

Who in their right mind would drink fuckin’ mango vodka? The likes of Emilia and Max, that’s who. Still, she did kill a zombie shark. Even potheads can kick some ass around here.

I snap one of the trunks holding her in place; I and Max help her stand up but then I see Emi can barely walk, because of her wounds and also because she’s totally stoned.

“We don’t have time until tomorrow.” I say, and just load her on my shoulder.

Emilia protests but I ignore her and take off at brisk pace towards the villa. Max struggles to keep up with me.

I put down my burden trying my best to be gentle and leave her to Ayu and Fox’s attentions. Also Stein emerged from the villa, while Frank and Yamori reached the position too. The two scientist are having a quite heated but hushed conversation.

Yoko has done the math:

“We are eleven survivors here. There are more still wandering around the beach. I could count 31 dead.”

Dana has recovered enough to go back to his usual ways of a man who dreamed he could be a KGB agent in the Soviet Union:

“Dead men tell no stories, and we’re all on the same boat here, right?”

“Dana, we’re all professionals here. We can keep our mouths shut.”, Oboe scolds him, “Casualties and their loved ones will be compensated.”

“Mr Oboe, did I not made you aware that leading the tornado so close to the beach was highly risky?”, Fox added.

“You did, as it is your duty. Yet, the final decision was mine. An unprecedented spectacle was necessary, Agent Fox.”

“Hell Uncle, a grhoovy storhy like this will drhive my gang bonkerhs!”, Max blurts out without realizing the situation.

Oboe grabs him by the collar:

“You ain’t gonna tell your friends about this, got it? Not if you wanna keep getting free stuff!”

“That’s a heavy ride!”, he protests. But he does nothing else.

***

It’s full, bright day now. The Natursearch teams are pulling up in their trucks, and a whole bloody A-420M with two recon drones flies in hugging the ground. Its bird-feather flaps fully extended allow the plane to fly incredibly slow so that it can drop four crab-like land drones.

The crabs start moving up and down the beach to observe, record, catalog and collect every interesting piece of debris and organic remain.

“That’s a cool as hell grave detail! I wish we had those beasts when I was in the Hunters!”, I comment.

“They can reduce the stress of disaster response personnel up to 60%”, Oboe adds.

Yoko has questions of her own:

“Autonomous AI control?”

“Semi-autonomous, they’re like very obedient dogs. One of our best inventions in the last three years.”

“I’d like to test one on a mission.”

“No problem! When you need it, call Oboe and we’ll send it over. The trial run is free!”.

It’s time to ride back home now, the party is over and the world ain’t ended. For the survivors at least. I can do decontamination on the way while Yoko drives.

But we should taker a shower first, we don’t wanna smudge our offroader with all the grime we got on us.