I wrote this for my friend who's not greatly
knowledgable about TFs so I thought I'd write a MV. She's a Maori nurse and while not called "Rangimarie" the character is based loosely on
her.
You can find a list of the Maori words translated at the bottom.
This is also my first attempt at MV, I've tried not to tread on anyone's toes in regards to use of characters. So, ah, let the critque/flamming begin!
OH, and its rather violent, I'd give it a PG but of course I'm a bit twisted and desensitised so maybe an M15 for those who are really soft. Slight
language with the occasional harsh swear.
Also, I don't know what happened, but it doesn't like my spacing, its bunched it all together so the paragraphs don't have a line space between
them on the screen, even though in the posting screen they do...
Timata meinga hei ururua
(Begin devastation)
Day Eight
Last time she'd smelt anything remotely similar was when the Marae was burnt down by a bunch of idiot Nazi wannabes. It was the smell of burning woods, plastics, foams, and something else, and thanks to her profession, she knew what it was.
Burning flesh.
It was the kind of stench that nagged at your senses until finally you felt the churning of your stomach and wondered if you could make it some place private to deposit the digesting remains of your most recent meal. Her employment, however, had seen to it that such an odour didn't bother her - it was the poor "civilians" who couldn't take it.
Many a phone call back home had her complaining to her Whanau about the overcrowding in this country, how the cities were so big and how she'd never experienced anything remotely similar. But now, she found herself walking alone along a debris ridden motorway. She stopped and looked down at the massive hole in front of her, a flattened car, or two… she couldn't be sure, sitting at the bottom of it, blood stains clinging to the once well cared for metal. Her eyes itched, but she fought the temptation to rub them, not knowing what covered her hands. Instead a cough came from her aching lungs, which took her concentration from her eyes.
Coughing, of course, was of benefit as she noticed the dark flecks of God only knew what that were now speckled on her handkerchief. She turned and looked back at the burning remains of the city, amongst the huge billowing plumes of smoke, towering up into the early evening sky, she could see movement.
What was that movie she'd been dragged to on a school trip? Independence Day or something? "The question of whether humans are alone in the universe has been answered?" Well, it was something like that. It was answered now, and she could figure it'd probably be a lot nicer for everyone concerned to be dealing with organic forms of alien life.
She felt the ground start to rumble, and at that point, decided to get off the road. She'd already had more exercise then she had in a year in the last few days, and certainly didn't want to be running away from another one of those things. She noticed a storm water drain near by and jumped over a few large chunks of… what looked like a Burger King sign… and crawled down into the slimy drain. There was a large pile of rocks and debris that served as a makeshift blockade into her newfound fortress of solitude as it were. She pushed a few stray bricks up into the hole she'd climbed through and hoped it'd just cover her enough.
Damn.
Hope it really was one of them; last place you wanna be in a quake is in a storm water drain!
Her thoughts were silenced suddenly as the rumbling intensified. She heard the sound of metal on concrete - that patu tank thing was rolling past. A squeak and she noticed a rat curled up in the corner. A hooded mink. She picked up the little creature, which snuggled into her abdomen. Together they cowered in the dimly lit, damp, stinking drain.
--
Day Nine
She wasn't sure how long she'd been asleep… or unconscious, but the rat didn't appear to have left her. Wasn't too impressed when she noticed he'd used her pocket as both a bed AND a toilet! She crawled to the pile of rocks and what not… hey, more of that BK sign… Carefully moving a brick she glanced out. The morbid glow of fires illuminated the surrounds only slightly. No human or animal movement. For all she knew one of those things could be having a @%% break on the mound of dirt above her. Deciding she couldn't stay down in the drain for much longer, she figured she best move on… as cautiously as possible. She strained her hearing as she slowly removed her wall, decommissioning her fort, as it were…
So far so good, no blast in the face. She mused as she looked out from the hole she'd made; she crawled out, facing upwards as much as possible until she was laying on her back her legs resting on the pile. Standing up slowly she wondered if her decision had been the right one, as cold and smelly and slimy as it had been in there, it wasn't as cold as the night that had settled without concern on the devastation wrought on humanity.
Wondering if her home was in similar condition she rubbed her hands on her pants and looked around. Same sort of environment, not a lot had changed, rubble was still rubble, charred trees still cracked as the wind blew them gently, and the remains of farm houses were still smouldering. The night sky did a good job of hiding the smoke, but the smell was still noticeable. The city seemed to be completely engulfed in flames now, the inferno having spread to the outlying suburbs. She decided, it was indeed, time to move on.
--
Walking was something she did for several reasons. Firstly, because she was too lazy to up grade her license from learners' to restricted, where she could actually drive. Secondly, petrol was hell expensive and she considered herself both a poor arse and a frugal one at that, more interested in saving her money to pay off her heinous student load. Thirdly, cars were expensive, then there was the WOF and rego, not to mention the stupid govt had decided to make insurance mandatory. Fourthly, she'd lived in a city with fantastic public transport and everything was in walking distance, so why bother with two and three? Finally, at number five, the environment. Not one to believe the bollocks that the ice caps were melting as a result of humanity, more likely planetary cycles but as a health care professional she was of the mindset it was better for humanity not to pumping CO2 and whatever else into what they breathed. So, walking excessive distances really was no skin off her nose.
The chuckle she gave was short, and almost mournful as she realised, that for all humanity's' concerns over the environment, it didn't mean ++*# now did it? The ash and dust from the burning cities would probably exist in the upper atmosphere for decades, temperatures would drop, an essential nuclear winter would begin, crops would die, animals would be next - if those things hadn't killed them for fun. Whoever survived this would most likely starve to death. A petrol tanker laid to her left, the middle crushed so the thing looked like a bow tie. The contents no where to be seen, maybe having been drunk by one of those car things? The driver of the truck had met a similar fate, his once robust trucker's belly having been unnaturally narrowed. The blood that had erupted up out of his mouth like a volcano had now dried about his face, neck and chest… which on closer inspection was torn open, possibly as a result of the pressure exerted on his tubby self. Not needing to check for a pulse, cos he was definitely dead, his brain lying three metres from his actual skull told her that, she decided to look away and continue, saying a karakia for him.
Another ten minutes of walking down the road and she stopped, she saw movement. It wasn't large enough to be one of those things… however, she had seen a few small ones running about doing some rather cruel damage. She cautiously approached and then realised there were humans.
It was a small convoy of two motor homes, a SUV, a rather damaged and dirty Mercedes and a school bus. They had pulled off the side of the road and were sheltering under the height of a tree covered cliff - those trees not yet burnt, amazingly. Sitting around a small smouldering pile of paper were a group of five adults, men, each holding some form of weapon.
"Hi".
She stated quietly as she walked in plain sight towards them - not wanting them to shoot because of a mistaken identify, of course, this was America, she could get shot anyway…
"Howdy".
A large black man responded, looking up at her. The others remained silent, heads down.
"Come take a seat".
Despite his greeting and invitation, the man didn't sound friendly. Exhaustion and mistrust probably a causative factor.
"Daddy?"
A small boy appeared out of the SUV, wearing only a pyjama bottom.
"Go back to sleep, Leo".
She noticed the boy had a series of bandages on his back and arms.
"What's wrong with your son?"
She asked, still standing.
"I got burnt; by one of those robots lasers… it really hurts".
"Just leave it, son, you'll make it worse if you poke it".
"Who did the dressings?"
"He's wearing pyjamas".
The father looked up at her like she was an idiot.
"No, I mean the bandages, who bandaged his wounds?"
"His mother".
"Can I talk to her?"
"You can if you have an Ouija board".
"Oh… I'm sorry. Look, I'm a nurse, maybe I can help?"
"Come into the light, where we can get a better look at you, girl".
An older man cradling an old style of shot gun grumbled.
"Oooh, sweet heart, wouldn't go running around in scrubs, if I were you?"
"Why not?"
She asked the old man.
"Those things, they did a bit of research on us. They see you in scrubs, they'll crush you like a bug. They've been taking out doctors, nurses, paramedics, fire fighters, police, anyone in a uniform or position of leadership and respect".
"Yeah, girl, I saw one take out a parking warden!"
"Heh, that's nothing, he be doing us a favour snuffing a warden, I saw one take out a supervisor from McDonalds".
"Riiiight… okay, can I examine your son or not?"
The father motioned for the boy and he came over.
He sat down and she sat behind him, carefully noting how the bandages were applied… then noting they weren't bandages… merely rags, possibly a pillow case or sheet?
"Was your mother a nurse?"
She asked, only after information.
"No, she taught people how to play the guitar".
"Oh, okay, neat".
She removed the makeshift bandages just enough to get a look at the wound and was quite mortified when she saw it, but kept that distress internal.
"You'll be fine, it'll just be sore for a few days, why don't you go back to sleep?"
She said to the small boy, he smiled, nodded, thanked her, then kissed his dad before returning to his mobile bed room.
"Its real bad, ain't it?"
The father whispered to her.
She nodded.
"How long he got?"
"Surprised he's still with you, actually, but maybe another day… lucky if he makes it through the night".
"Where you heading?"
The old man asked, wanting not to talk about a child with fatal injuries.
"Don't really have a destination, just wanted to get away from those damn things".
"Crazy accent you got there, where you from?"
Another asked.
"According to CNN, where I'm from doesn't exist any more, so I don't see a point in sharing".
Accent or not, she came across a bit snappy on that one.
"Sorry, you're just being polite".
"It's okay, hon, chances are all our home towns are gone too".
An uncomfortably morose silence descended on them and they sat watching the fire burn out without another word.
--
Day Ten
The sun seemed to have a hard job pushing its rays through the atmosphere onto the earth. They didn't have the same strength or power they usually had, and that damn smell still lingered. The convoy was having breakfast, she was offered a Twinkie, but politely turned it down. Total devastation of humanity or not, she wasn't going to be eating that long lasting ++*#. She walked over to the SUV; the father was sitting on the step, looking down at the remains of his shoes.
"You were right about him not making it through the night".
"I'm sorry".
She said softly, not much else to say, really.
"Well, he's with his mum now, and the rest of the family".
The man looked up at her.
"Thanks anyway".
She didn't say anything and simply watched him get up and walk towards the group.
They were in the midst of an argument, some wanted to stay put, others were more frightened and believed they needed to get going. Others were saying that they needed to find underground shelter for when the governments started nuking those bastards. From what she knew of the American president, he would have used them first chance he got, not wait a few days before irradiating his home soil. So, chances were, he and all his staff were dead, or at the very least, the nuke bases gone… That old guy did make mention of them doing a lot of research. It stood to reason if they perceived a nurse as a threat then they'd definitely want to be taking out every missile silo on the planet.
The argument suddenly went from an exchange of ideas to people having guns aimed in their faces; voices were raised, which concerned her, no need to make themselves a larger target. A gun went off, and blood sprayed all over a near by tree, children started screaming, and more fire. She jumped in behind the bus and covered her head. Suddenly she felt that familiar rumble. She'd offered help, had a look at some kid's burns, even turned down their meagre rations - for their benefit, of course, not eating a Twinkie would do her health a great deal of good. But with that rumble under foot, gun shots, screams and just general unrest, she decided she didn't want to be anywhere near here any longer. She debated taking off into the trees, but decided against when she noticed a plume of smoke in the distance. She headed back towards the road. No one noticed her departure.
She found a pile of rocks at the edge of the cliff, pretty sure they hadn't' been there the night before - even in the dark she figured she'd have noticed something that obvious. The tank suddenly appeared on the distance as a maroon dot, she ducked in behind the rocks and found a little cave, hoping it didn't have some sleeping bear or wad of snakes or scorpions or whatever nasties America housed, she slid into it. It wasn't very deep, but she managed to get her entire body into it, she heard a sudden rustle and her heart almost stopped… then she remembered the rat! He was still sleeping in her pocket, that lazy bastard! She cupped her hand over her pocket to keep it from making a noise against her care plan. The rumbling was suddenly very loud and the whole earth seemed to shudder, little pebbles rolled down landing on her head. She was able to see the tread of the war machine scrape past, it stopped, then with a huge bang the thing shunted backwards. It had fired.
Then the screams started. Gun shots rung out and she could hear the pinging of bullets striking the armoured plated death. She didn't see any dishonour in hiding, she felt sorry for the kids, but what could she do for them? She couldn't stand up against that thing, what was she going to do? Don't come any closer! I can throw these dried up rat faeces pretty hard! There was the sound of a massive explosion and the whole earth shook again, she actually debated whether it had been a wise decision to hide in a small hole at the bottom of a cliff face that was obvious unstable. Regardless, she was here now and she had to stay put.
The creature unfolded into the robot form, she heard it utter a series of profanities strewn between phrases like "KA POWIE" and "BLAMMO". She actually wondered if he suffered from some robot form of Tourettes syndrome. Regardless, that one was a sadist, she'd seen him kill, and he was different to some of the others, he took his time, and he had a tendency to kill in the most blood spilling way possible, she'd seen the results of what he churned out. He was a monster, no two ways about it.
The first time she'd come across him, she'd come running around the corner of a half collapsed high school building to find him kneeling over a pile of young bodies, he was holding one of them in his hands and twisting it. She'd done a stint in orthopaedic surgery, and while she enjoyed it, and had no problems with the noise and sight of breaking and fixing bones and joints, the sound coming from that teen hadn't been pleasant. He was ringing the blood out of the remains, and then running his hands through it before holding them up to his face. He smeared it on the concrete and seemed fixated on the blood. It was then she noticed movement in the pile, one was still alive, an older boy, he got up and ran, but only made it about two metres from the monster, about the length of its arm. Without even so much as a glance in his direction, the alien lifted his fist and bought it crashing down on the boy, the resulting destruction of the boy's body was something, even as a nurse, she didn't want to dwell on the physics of.
Thinking ahead to a future where these creatures were long gone, she saw herself sitting in a shrink's office describing this moment, sitting there in that cramped hole for nine hours listening to that bastard murder those children, those people. It was his laugh that bored into her. She could see herself being hauled away into some psych ward, waiting to be drugged up or lobotomised as there was no help for what she had. Hell, not even her shifts were that long! The rat had come out a few times and crawled around her, but didn't seem to want to leave, she had half a muesli bar in her pocket. She hadn't reached the point of desperation where she would actually eat it. She'd dropped it in a pile of intestines, cleaned it as best she could, and hoped when and if the time came where she would throw caution to the wind and down the thing that who's ever intestines they'd been, hope they didn't have Hep or AIDS or something. A serious psych history was one thing, but she didn't want liver failure in her future. Of course, the rat wasn't so discerning and gorged himself on a few pieces.
When she woke she was thoroughly amazed that she had actually gotten some sleep in that hole. The rat was certainly having an alright day, lazy bugger didn't even have to walk; she was carrying him around, feeding him, keeping him warm! She mentally told herself if she made it to safety today, she'd name him.
The creature having long since departed, she felt safe enough to climb out, but drilled into her brain not to turn her body to look to the right, she didn't want to see any more of that things "art work". Her body obeyed, and she walked off towards the road. There was no point telling herself there could be people alive, and as a nurse she had a moral and professional duty to return to check for survivors. Even if she hadn't the experience, she had the distinct feeling that the monster wouldn't be as sloppy as to leaves survivors. There was certainly no point in taking their guns, as they were perfectly useless. She contemplated food supplies, but decided she'd rather take food from people she hadn't met, and hadn't heard die.
--
It was evening again. She hadn't run into any more of those damn things, of course, she'd seen plenty more of their callous handiwork. The rain started to fall at about 1800hr. It was a cold rain; the wind had picked up and was blowing the big floppy droplets in horizontally. The water smelt horrid, and was an almost black, the grit and ash of the city… and burning people, was now raining down on her. She looked around for shelter, figuring the rain could cause trouble, especially if it changed to acid rain. There really wasn't much left standing. Just rubble and charred cars. She noticed an overturned minivan off the other side of the road in a ditch. Amazingly it hadn't burnt, she was equally amazed, and grateful, that there were blankets, food and water in there… of course, there was a good stash of Twinkies. She decided to take a few for the rat, the little man could afford to loose a bit of weight, but he might not get a meal for a while. He was obviously someone's much loved, and spoilt pet. Both his colouring and demeanour spoke to that. There were a few boxes of muesli bars, a few loaves of bread, some canned spaghetti, spam, tuna, a few too many packets of chips, several packets of lollies and a huge stash of chocolate bars. She bundled the foods into a pillow case she found in the back, then took a swig from one of the bottled waters she'd found. Noticing the large blood stain on the front seat and the large amount of shattered glass she decided not to give too much thought to the fate of the previous occupants. OF course, with the amount of food she had just found, their fate can't have been that favourable, as who would leave so much here… of course, they could have had so much food that the mum said "we're not taking that junk, leave it… you bought white bread, do you know how bad that is for you? Right, that's it mister, you're grounded!"
She curled up in the back and with the rain gentling plodding down on the underside of the vehicle, she let exhaustion take her and she drifted into a nightmare filled sleep.
--
Day Eleven
It pissed her off.
Just another reason to hate those damn things.
Waking with a rather irritating leg cramp, in the back of the van, the smell of the rain was horrid. To her, there was nothing nicer then the smell in the environment after a fresh rain, there was a favourable crispness to it. It was replaced now with an acrid, burning stench. Climbing out of the van caused her to get incredibly messy, the rain having bought down the ash from the cities, and the people, and mixing that into the soil. Soil, which had soaked up a considerable amount of blood and petrol creating a rather unpleasant sludge. Standing up she looked around. Nothing much had changed since the night before, still devastation, still mounds of rubble and over turned cars. The mucky rain having somewhat extinguished, or at least suppressed the near by fires and smouldering remains. She walked along the ditch for about 30 metres until she started hearing crunching sounds, deciding it wouldn't be safe to walk over it, she clambered up out of the trench, looking back she saw a human hand, charred and blacked sticking out of the mud.
"Dear Jesus".
She whispered.
A prayer, not a profanity.
Just another reason to hate those damn things.
With her pillow case full of treats she continued on her way. Not really knowing what way that was.
The rat scurried up out of her pocket and made it to her shoulder where it happily sat. He sniffed in her ear and started clasping wayward strands of soggy hair.
"You're a cute little man, aren't you? Haven't figured a name for you yet though, my smushy friend".
She said softly, giving him a scratch under his chin.
--
After following the road which began to wind up and down over hills for close to five hours she found a small town. At first it looked undamaged, but as she came closer she saw evidence to the contrary. There were no burning fires or piles of rubble. The proof lay out in front of the small town, about three kilometres in from the "WELCOME TO…" sign.
Piles and piles of human corpses.
They were stacked haphazardly in a huge heap. Flies were already buzzing about, a rather large throng of birds were hopping about the bodies, picking, tearing, gorging. Well, at least some are benefiting, she thought sadly. A huge pool of blood had spread out from the mound, staining the concrete they lay on and then running into the brown grass. They had been placed on the parking lot of what was once probably a gardening centre or farming supplies store. There had been no prejudice exhibited by those responsible for the deceased mob. All ages were included, both gender and every conceivable nationality that had lived in the town or near enough to it to be caught up in such blood letting. She debated getting too close, could what have done this still be here? Did she want to risk walking through the latest edition to the ghost town genre? She couldn't turn back and she didn't' know where else to head.
Further into the town the damage became more obvious, broken windows and glass doors, destroyed and burnt cars, most over turned. A large stack of cars, a bus, two vans and the cab of a semi was mangled in a charred heap next to a building, which on closer look was the town's Anglican Church, the steeple lying in splinters across the parking lot. There was blood smeared all over the steps, remains of the doors, and walls of the structure. She decided against entering. Giving thought to these people feeing to the house of God for some level of protection they didn't find it chilled her blood.
As she moved out of the CBD and into the surrounding residential area, the destruction became more intense, bodies strewn on footpaths, garden lawns, in the door ways. Huge pools of blood with the minced remains of humanity dotted in the middle were everywhere; the gutters ran red with blood that flowed along it like a tiny Nile. Even the pets of these poor souls were not spared, as she found dead dogs and cats, birds, rabbits and even a huge arse snake. It was savagely tied into a knot and hung from a lamp post that's light had been shattered, flecks of blood indicated to her that either the snake had been used to smash the glass, or something else had…
At the end of the street she come across a rather odd sight. A police car. It was parked meticulously against the side of the road and didn't appear to have a singe, scratch or speck of human death on it. What added to the fright of it was the fact that the surrounding homes had huge amounts of damage done to them. Most of the homes were still smouldering, obviously the showers that rolled over the night before had extinguished the worst of the blazes. How could a cop car be so unblemished in this environment?
A replay of the events of the initial hours of the occupation past through her mind… at the hospital, an ambulance had come screaming up to the loading bay at the back of the A&E, but it didn't look like the ones she was used to seeing in this country. It slammed right into the building and drove right through the emergency department, veering towards people intentionally as it unfolded into a massive robot and started crushing, shooting and swearing. After that damn thing had chased her and three other colleagues, she'd managed to find an alternative exit which led her into the path of a fire truck, which transformed into a metallic pyro.
There was no police man and no marks of war. What cop worth his salt would hide away in a parking building polishing his patrol car as alien robots ravaged his home? None, she'd wager. Hell, there was a cop at A&E that morning, which looked like he fit right in on the Biggest Looser, chowing down on a box of doughnuts that jumped into action, sadly for him; he was one of the first to be struck down by that ambulance cretin.
IF those damn things took the forms of ambulances and fire engines, it was a perfectly logical thought that they could take the forms of police cars. And given the grief that ambo had given her, it'd be best if she quickly skirted off out of view, and hope like hell that thing hadn't seen her. Of course, given her current luck, it wasn't too be. She'd jumped the fence of a near by home and was planning to run through back yards, when she heard the all too familiar sound of transformation. She turned back and looked at what was now walking towards her, she gave a small cry of surprise, lost her balance and fell backwards over the fence, her four legged friend stunned, took off towards the house.
"Aw crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP!"
The left leg of her pants caught on a stray nail.
"AH! To hell with dignity!!"
She screeched and managed to wriggle completely out of her pants before taking off round the back of the house, the heavy thumping and vibrations in the ground a disquieteningly indication that that thing was in hot pursuit.
There was a small gate between the edge of the house and the boundary fence, she clambered up over it her foot catching on the top section, unsettling her balance which sent her down to the ground and too the left, smack bang into a bush of blackberries.
"PURARI! Who the hell has black berries in the 'burbs?"
She growled as she tangled herself free.
Reaching the clothes line in the centre of the back yard was when that thing made it into her line of sight. It engaged in some wanton destruction of the home, smashing the entire side of the house, and making use of the demolition began hurling large heaps of masonry at the pants less RN. An overturned dog kennel in the far corner of the yard gave her leverage to get up and over the next fence without tripping. She fled through the neighbours' house and back out onto road, seeing her ratty companion nibbling at pillow case she had dropped. Rats were lighter then a sack full of food, she scooped the stunned little bastard up and slid him back into her pocket as she sprinted across the road towards another section of housing. The creature smashed right through the house she'd just exited and in the clear was picking up speed, a blast of red light flashed past her slamming into the house exploding the wooden structure in a huge ball of flame and flying splinters, glass and furniture. The surging adrenalin through her human system gave protection from the pain caused by the burns and searing projectiles and the added benefit of endurance. A volley of blasts continued and over the tops of the fences in the distance she could see a higher building, a school or shopping centre perhaps? Whatever it was, perhaps if she made it there she might actually be able to hide somewhere or loose the damn thing.
A rev of a car's engine came from behind her it was followed by the squealing of tires and loud crashing sounds.
"I'm in the ++*# now!"
She gasped as she leapt over the broken body of an elderly woman, her walker lying near by, one of the wheels spinning slowly. The poor woman's dead yappy dog lay a few metres to her right… well, half of her yappy dog.
What the hell is wrong with these things?
She thought inwardly as the next yard revealed the remains of a once heavily pregnant woman and the body parts of at least three children under the age of ten.
A tremendous roar followed by an all too familiar crashing sound, a glance over her shoulder, eyes widened as the car was now metres from her, in the same yard and was barrowing towards her.
"DEAR GOD BE OPEN!"
She screamed as she ran straight at the back door. The Lord answered her prayer and the door collapsed under her power as she took a sharp right into the hallway of the home and just hoofed it down the blood splattered carpet towards a shattered window at the end. The roof and walls behind her started to collapse, the sounds of the car's tires screeching on the tiles of the kitchen floor an indication that it was pulling a hard right and hell bent on running her down.
What the hell ever happened to live and let live?
She thought as she dived out the remains of the window, adrenaline or not, she did feel the shards of glass dig into her exposed legs and even through her clothing, cutting her without discrimination. The house having been built on a high foundation served to give her a metre and a bit drop to the concrete drive below.
No time to complain.
No time to cry.
No time to weep over her wounds.
No time to rest.
No time to feel.
She was up on an aching ankle and bolting across the road towards the large building she'd noticed from a few homes away. The alien acclerated in its car mode and smashed through the wall, and flew through the air for a few metres, slammed into the neighbouring shed then on well treaded tires pivoted before coming straight at her again. She was well aware of her predicament, her most pressing issue the fact that she was running across clear ground towards the back entrance of a school, that thing was a car, it was gunning it, it would easily catch up with her. She had to outsmart the thing with a computer for a brain. She ducked into a series of bushes, several of which were roses, and rushed along towards another house that sat on the boundary of the school. A few nicely coloured blobs of flora weren't going to slow that **%$#$@ thing down. She ran round the back of the house and found herself staring at an LPG bottle sitting atop a BBQ. She grabbed it. Grunting when she realised it had been recently filled, she removed the safely valve and turned it on full. If the hissing sound hadn't alerted her to the leaking fuel the smell sure as hell did. She wasn't sure what the hell would ignite the damn thing, but the alien was causing so much damage it was bound to spark something. She rolled the canister down the steps of the veranda and then was off running again, leave things to fate, or God, or science or sheer dumb luck.
She was on the other side of the fence in the school grounds when the earth shook with an almighty whack. The corrugated iron structure shielded her from the fire ball that was engulfing the house and backyard behind. She had no time to check if she'd done any damage to that thing or even slowed it down. Honestly, given her experiences, she gave absolutely no hope to having taken out one of those things. She began her sprint across the school field towards the seriously damaged school buildings.
She ignored the bodies.
She ignored the strewn bins.
She even ignored the huge flap of roof that now lay at the edge of the playground.
It was the ruined playground that grabbed her attention and earned a quick glance. The metal jungle gym bent and distorted into something that resembled a human skeleton, part of the slide had been borrowed and rounded up into a skull type structure. If the past while was anything to go by, it was hard to appreciate the artistic nature of the thing.
She made it to a huge hole in the side of the building; she turned and glanced back towards the towering black pile of smoke, and saw the alien, in humanoid form stumbling out. Even at that distance, the thing looked really ticked off. Best to put as many metres between herself and that thing as possible. She took off down the blood and flesh covered hall.
These things certainly liked to spill our blood.
Class rooms were suffering various degrees of devastation, some had burnt out, others were a mess of blood and broken desks, others had piles of dead children and most were littered with broken glass and hanging ceiling tiles. She ducked through a room that wasn't so badly dishevelled, out an emergency exit, which was smeared with blood and came out into a small quad… another pile of corpses met her sight. Most of the bodies belonged students, children. A few adults lay about the place with obviously horrific injuries, bones protruding, intestines dangling out, brains scooped out of fractured skulls. And pools and pools of blood. She had no time to pay them heed, and just bolted across towards the cafeteria. The distant sound of a car becoming louder.
The cafeteria was a mess, but the amount of damage was really no different to the rest of the school. The foods that the children had on their menu that day was already rotting, something that resembled mince was already teaming with maggots. She ignored the stench and ducked through into the kitchen.
"WHERE ARE YOU FLESH CREATURE!?!"
She heard a voice roar from outside, she didn't need two guesses as to who it belonged to.
Gas.
She ran towards the stoves and started turning them on, the gas hissed out and the familiar stench filled the large room… given the amount of damage she suddenly realised it probably wasn't a good idea, if there was an exposed wire…
Making it across the scattered pots and pans, broken crockery, strewn cutlery, a few bodies and a good deal of food mess, she made it out the back exit into a small ally way. An open door was within reach, she dashed through into what was the gym.
More bodies.
A huge smash from somewhere behind her and a huge string of profanities in a foreign tongue indicated it was back in action. Profanities in any language were identifiable by a series of vocal tones and pitches, and just the sheer volume and anger gave evidence to her hypothesis. At the other side of the building she heard a huge explosion. It was so massive she was picked up and slammed against the door she was heading towards. In her dazed, slightly concussed state she actually gave thought to the possibility that the alien had caught up with her, but the sudden burst of heat told her it was a shock wave, and that her little trick with the gas stoves in the kitchen actually worked.
Was it Jurassic Park where she'd seen that trick? Maybe a horror movie.
Not the time to think about it. She was up on her feet again and was bolting down another corridor, her head throbbing; pain in all her limbs, a rather unpleasant stinging sensation told her she was burnt. But no time to slow, no time to be a baby about it. If she stopped, it'd catch her, it'd kill her, and probably not in any quick way, especially given what she'd done to the bastard.
Within moments of pain and exhaustion, her lungs stinging with overuse and gas fumes and soot and stress starting to make their protests known, she ignored it and found herself standing in the teachers' car park. She darted around the cars towards the road; up ahead she could see forest, or a park… well, trees.
Her aversion to running into that sort of environment in light of recent events not withstanding, she just had to do it and hope like hell the thing coming behind her with a foul mouth wouldn't think she'd headed in there.
Man, she was so screwed.
She was half way across the road towards the woods when her thoughts about not seeing the forest for the trees were interrupted by that thing screeching something along the lines of an unrepeatable English curse. It'd seen her, and it'd know where she was running, and she had no way of making any other directional change. Something exploded to her right, chunks of road and clumps of dirt smacked her one, causing her to loose her balance and topple over, she rolled sideways and then pushed herself up, amazingly still maintaining her running speed. She crashed into the thick undergrowth just as a huge explosion struck a metre on her left, she was slammed by the shockwave into a large tree, a protruding branch tearing into her shoulder, if she was any shorter it would have ripped into her carotid and jugular vessels. At least that would have been a quick death, she lamented. The burns she sustained from that blast were much more serious, she was aware of that when she noticed a chunk of her skin, charred, splattered on a nearby tree. If it wasn't' for a larger tree between her and the blast she'd probably have been killed.
She kept pushing herself, realising she didn't think she could hang on much longer. Regardless of her up and coming death she didn't want to be killed by that thing, she started wondering about near by cliffs.
The loud crashing of trees and native plant life from behind meant it was coming up fast. When she looked back she could see the bright blue optics burning with a hatred worthy of any human fascist despot, and he was gaining… it would probably only be minutes now. It was getting hard to run now, her limbs becoming sluggish, adrenaline stores were wearing down, the pain in her bare legs was excruciating, the damn piece of tree sticking out of her shoulder kept catching on other branches yanking about the wound and making the hole even bigger… she hated to think of the damage it was doing internally, but hoping like hell it'd tear an artery and she'd bleed out in a few minutes. With reflection on her crappy fortune she contemplated that time span wouldn't be quick enough, that damn thing would be on her before she'd die, in pain, but at least not at its hands.
Her awfully blatant, almost clichéd lack of beneficial kismet didn't stop with being chased by an alien robot, having been in multiple explosions and now getting stuck with trees and branches… she let out the most horrid scream as she put her foot through a soggy fallen trunk… which just so happened to be home of a rather large nest of hornets. Her home country not afflicted by hornets, merely the irritant of the European wasp. If she'd just seen them she would have just though them an odd kind of fly, but no, in her series of horrid days it wouldn't be enough. She had to get attacked by a rather nasty pack of insects that God should have never formed!!
Her utterances loud and mirroring the level of obscenity of a death row inmate, a sailor or that alien. She had to continue her sprint now, not because of that damn metal catastrophe that was hunting her down, but to try and outrun those god damn bugs. She pushed her little body as much as it would allow until she found herself without support, she had run over a cliff she had been desiring. Unfortunately for her mortality it wasn't very high and at the bottom of it was a gently following creek. She landed hard in the shallow water, but a quick run along the direction of flow and she was able to loose the hornets, they hadn't really the brain size to notice she was now below them.
A sudden splash behind her and she now acutely aware of her original problem, the thing was standing less than ten metres from her in the creek.
"Oh would you just ##+! off!"
She bellowed at it, before turning and trying to run up the bank. She heard it laugh. The bastard was enjoying it. It could have very easily killed her at that moment, but it was actually using her as a game. At this point she promised whatever was listening to her inner monologue that should she survive, and humanity regains its world, that her hunts for rabbits and opossums would centre solely on pest control and wouldn't track the little shits for sport when she had nothing better to do on her tribe's land.
Clambering up over the soggy earth, in the most horrendous pain, she started to wonder if maybe she should just let it kill her, sure, it'd probably hurt like a $%#!@, but honestly, how worse could it be? Could it even resemble what she was experiencing now? Well, probably, but death was death, and it didn't matter if it took five minutes or five hours to arrive, if it was coming, at least that was something to look forward to. The inky blackness of peace. Wow, was she ever looking forward to that.
As she stood up and looked back at the iron beast she noticed it was smiling at her and holding what looked like a rather unpleasant piece of metal roofing it'd rolled up. It started towards her.
Okay, change of plans.
She mused as she took a massive gasp and found her second wind, taking off into the nature that wouldn't last much longer under alien rule.
Don't let it kill me. Don't want to beaten to a pulp with roofing iron. ##+! it.
She continued to think as she caught the stick in her arm on a tree, it ripped right put, blood spewed down her burnt arm and she cried out again. The creature behind her laughed again.
"Let me end your suffering, little bag of meat, I will be merciful. I promise!!"
It started laughing.
"Mother fucker".
She gasped.
"I HEARD THAT!"
It tore the trees that she'd just passed right out of the earth and threw them at her. She found herself caught in a throng of pine needles and sharp branches.
"What the hell is wrong with you?!"
She screamed, tears of pain and stress spilling from her emerald eyes as she struggled to get free.
The creature lifted up its makeshift club.
A flash of purple light flew over her head and struck the beast, it staggered backwards; another blast caused it to loose its
balance and fall back into a sitting position.
Certainly not one to look a gift horse in the mouth she struggled free of her organic prison, sneezed as the pine needles irritated her sinuses, and attempted to hobble in a different direction to the beast, and the origin of the light.
The rat made himself known again by the large amount of urine he left on her shirt, but given the amount of blood and other gunk she'd left on it, it didn't concern her. The rat was shuddering within the stained fabric, but had some semblance of good sense to stay in her pocket and not go running off into what could be a quick and flattening death. Mind you, the more likely story was that the poor chap was as scared as her and unable to move. She was scared, but needed to move. Fight or flight. No way in hell she could fight these things, time again for flight and let whatever blasted that thing take over.
Of course, it didn't help that the unpleasant metallic alien was getting up, its optics brightly burning with that familiar malice and aimed straight at her. It took a swipe at her with its massive hand clenched in a brutal fist. The disturbance to the air it caused knocked her damaged slight form fall back, lying there, waiting for death; she saw the origin of the blast.
"I thought you were dead, Decepticon scum".
The alien spoke.
There was no response. Well, not a verbal one, another blast ripped towards it, pushing the monster back and down amongst the felled trees.
A string of profanities directed at the new comer, certainly not repeatable in polite company, and the beast got up, he made a native hand gesture of scorn, defiance and generally just an unseemly notion of distain before it walked off back the way it came. The obscenities still being quite audible.
She turned and looked up at the so called "scum" and swallowed hard, fear freezing her momentarily, this one was much taller and bulkier than the other.
"Blitzwing to Astrotrain, I've found an injured human".
She watched him as she slowly found the ability to move backwards, breathing heavily through her mouth, the pain no longer the primary focus.
"Don't be afraid of us, little human. We're here to help".
She spun around to face the direction she was backing and looked up to behold a being similar in height to the one who had, for intents and purposes, saved her.
"We don't mean you any harm. We know where there are other humans, humans who can look after your injuries".
"Um… okay".
"By way of introduction, I'm Astrotrain, that's my chum Blitzwing".
"Yeah…".
"Climb aboard, if you can".
He crouched down and laid his heavy set hand on the ground for her to climb on. She looked rather unconvinced, but her exhaustion and sheer gratitude that one of them had blasted that creature overrode her want to just turn and run off. She obeyed and once sitting in the palm of his hand found it surprisingly comfortable, or at least contouring to her spine.
"I'm bleeding… all over you".
She said weakly, sheepishly.
"Hey, no worries, that's why they make soap right? You got a name?"
"Rangimarie".
"What?"
He looked confused.
"Rangimarie, or just Marie".
"What does that mean?"
He asked, stumped by the language.
"It means "peace".
She passed out.
--
Day 47
"Wow, you're awake".
She looked over at the new comer as she managed to sit herself up.
"Some of the cons bought you in, helpful bunch… mind you…"
He trailed off.
He was a husky looking man, with dark grey eyes and a shaved head which didn't do anything to detract from the fact he was very clearly balding. He was probably in his late 40s, maybe early 50s. His clothes, while clean, were ripped and charred in various places. His face covered with stubble as he obviously didn't have access to a Gillette.
"You're a nurse, right?"
"Yeah… how do you know that?"
Her throat felt a little scratchy, she sucked at her tongue for a moment to moisten her mouth.
"Your security badges… anyway… what's an RN doing with a rat in her pocket?"
"Oh, I met him on my travels… suppose you got rid of him, or cooked him".
"Heaven's no. At first we were going to pop him in the pot, I haven't had a serve of meet since that day… besides, he's such a friendly little blighter".
An English accent.
"The 'con told me your name's Marie, mine's Tobias. And apologies, our attempts to patch you up weren't that great, none of us have any real medical training, the most we got between us is a mandatory work place first aide course".
"Oh, okay, well, I can give myself a look over; it's the branch in the arm that was the problem".
"Yeah, that was a darned mess alright".
"Where am I?"
"Where…? Geographically speaking I don't really have any clue… I'd just arrived here with my wife for a holiday, we were off to visit our son, he's getting married… well, and he was supposed to. Today".
He went quiet.
No further questions on that subject, she made the mental note.
"As for where as a point of order, you're in a bomb shelter. Apparently there used to be a government building here, but they tore it down in the late 80s, something about asbestos, but the shelter is still here. One of our members used to work here, so that's how we found it".
"Oh."
There was a silence between them for a few moments, she wanted more, but wasn't sure how to ask, or even what to ask, and damn was she tired.
"Well, I'll leave you to get some sleep".
He walked towards the door with a kind of quiet determination that seemed a bit showy under the circumstances.
"Welcome to the resistance".
He said, without turning back, as he walked out.
--
Marae - "Meeting House"
Patu - (Colloquial slang, "crap, crappy, ++*#, essentially rubbish - though oringal meaning is that it was a form of club used to club people, usually made of bone or greenstone)
Whanau - Family
Karakia - Prayer
Purari - bl 0 0 dy bugg 3r! Da m m i t! Essentially a curse word indicating annoyance.
