"John, for crying out loud, get a grip! Back in the day, you reeked worse than Steve here on your best day. Now move that bike, we're rolling!" Michael's voice crackled through the walkie-talkie, a blend of exasperation and forced cheer. He was doing a spot of impromptu diplomacy, urging the minotaur to cease his obvious, nostril-flaring distaste for their new guide. The mission, finding Zhang Tiezhu's hidden bolt-hole, took precedence over olfactory sensitivities. It was a simple fix: a direct order from the Lord of Cinder Town, and a pointed reminder of John's own formerly pungent past. The convoy, now with the grizzled scavenger Steve perched nervously on the cargo rack behind a distinctly unamused guard, rumbled onward, leaving a fresh plume of dust in the still, murderous air.
As the kilometers unspooled beneath the tires, a curious shift in the landscape began to impress itself upon Michael. It was subtle at first, a mere suggestion of change at the edge of perception. The ubiquitous, skeletal cacti seemed to grow in denser, more defiant clusters. Then, taller, desiccated grasses, bleached blonde by the sun and standing as high as a man's shoulder, began to punctuate the gravel plains. He even caught the frantic, iridescent dart of large insects. Life, in its stubborn, parched forms, was asserting itself more boldly here. A quiet wonder, quickly followed by a sharper puzzlement, took root in his mind. Why had the founders of Cinder Town chosen that particular patch of blasted, featureless dust when places like this, however marginal, existed? The logic of survival here was a cipher he was still decoding.
He noticed, however, that his men showed no appreciation for the slightly-improved scenery. Instead, their posture grew taut, their eyes endlessly scanning the rust-colored hills and tangled stands of thorny brush. Their hands stayed closer to their weapons. A palpable tension had settled over the group, a silent communication of shared vigilance. Michael swallowed his questions, his own senses sharpening in response to their unspoken alarm. His knuckles whitened slightly on the steering wheel.
Then, it appeared. A mirage made flesh. To the left of their path, sprawling for what seemed like miles, was an oasis. Not a paltry trickle of green, but a vast, improbably lush expanse. Michael actually pinched the flesh of his own thigh, hard. The jolt of pain confirmed it. Towering trees, their canopies a dense, vibrant green against the washed-out sky, rose like ancient sentinels. The air above them shimmered with the darting shapes of birds. After the monochrome death of the open Wasteland, the sight was almost physically painful in its vibrancy. Paradise, his brain supplied, uselessly. Why wasn't there a settlement here? A thriving town? It made no sense. The question bubbled up, urgent and demanding.
"John, why on earth would—" he began, thumbing the talk button.
"Hush!" The minotaur's voice cut through the speaker, a sharp, strained whisper that was utterly unlike his usual bellow. "My apologies, Lord, but I should have warned you. We move fast. No horn. Voices low. As quiet as ghosts. You will see why. Soon."
The answer came not a minute later. The road—or what passed for one—curved, granting a fuller view of the oasis's heart. There, nestled within the embrace of the unnaturally vigorous forest, lay a vast, mirror-still lake. And beyond the lake, rising like the decayed bones of a slain behemoth, was the ruin. It wasn't a cluster of buildings; it was a carcass of a city, a sprawling, jagged silhouette of broken towers and gutted superstructures that blotted out the horizon. Its scale was incomprehensible, a graveyard of steel and concrete so vast its far edges melted into the heat haze.
A cold, sick understanding washed over Michael. Detroit.They were skirting the fringes of the Detroit Exclusion Zone. The epicenter. The place that had taken the brunt of it. The lushness of the plant life wasn't a blessing; it was a biomarker, a screaming testament to the radiation that had soaked this soil. Like Chernobyl, reclaimed by a forest that didn't know it was poisoned. And this, according to every Wasteland story whispered over weak beer, was the heart of Infected territory. A shiver that had nothing to do with the cab's struggling AC slithered down his spine. How many of those things lurked in those shadowed, verdant canyons of rubble? Each one, as he now knew, a match for a third-level warrior.
The thought of attracting a hordeof them was enough to make his scalp crawl. Instinctively, he eased the accelerator down, the truck's engine groaning in protest as it tried to pull the heavier water truck faster. He fumbled in the door pocket, his mind racing. The Geiger counter was buried in his pack. No time. "Raoul! My bag! The white bottle, the pills—now!" The wolf-kin, still looking sore, scrambled. He passed over the plastic bottle of potassium iodide tablets. Michael dry-swallowed two, ignoring the chalky, chemical taste. He knew, from furtive internet searches in another life, that they were largely theater against this kind of ambient exposure. But the theater was necessary. The ritual of defense, however flimsy, was a bulwark against the formless dread seeping from that beautiful, terrible green place.
A new, chilling realization dawned. Quiet?How could they be quiet? The truck's diesel engine was a lumbering, metallic roar in the profound silence. The bicycles were comparatively stealthy, but his vehicle was a shouting announcement of their presence.
As if summoned by the thought, the walkie-talkie burst into panicked static. "Contact! From the tree line! Many contacts—Infected! They've spotted us! Pedal! For your lives, pedal!"
Michael's head snapped to the left. At the verdant edge where life met the dead plain, movement erupted. Dozens of them. Thirty, perhaps more. They spilled from the shadows under the trees, a wave of distorted, lurching motion, their forms a blasphemy against the vibrant backdrop. They moved with that same terrifying, galloping speed, closing the distance with horrifying intent. If that wave caught them, it would be a massacre.
No orders were needed. The convoy became a machine of pure flight. Bicycles seemed to leap forward, riders standing on the pedals, muscles corded. Michael shoved the gearshift, the truck protesting as it found a lower, screaming gear. Speed was all that mattered. The chase was a terrifying, silent tableau—the grinding roar of their engines, the frantic rustle of tires on grit, and behind, the sight of that nightmare pack flowing over the land.
They ran. And after what felt like an eternity, with the lead Infected perhaps a kilometer behind, the pursuit ceased. The pack slowed, then halted at the very edge of the green, as if tethered by some invisible leash to their poisoned Eden. They stood, a line of shambling silhouettes, watching their prey escape.
Michael's breath left him in a ragged gust. Safety. For now. But the retreat revealed another truth: the Infected were creatures of flesh and terrible will, but not of endless stamina. Their burst speed had limits. It was a small, cold comfort. He kept driving, giving the verdant hellscape a wide, respectful distance, his eyes avoiding its deceptive beauty.
They passed the shells of smaller towns, satellites to the dead metropolis. Michael gave each a wide berth. Who knew what slept in those lesser ruins? The concept of 'roads' had died with the old world. Now, the open, cracked plain was the only highway that mattered.
By late morning, the convoy finally ground to a halt. Steve, pointing a trembling finger, indicated a series of bald, weathered hills ahead. "There, Lord. Behind those. The valley is hidden. A crack in the rock, easy to miss."
Despite the anxiety gnawing at him—What happened to Zhang Tiezhu? Are we too late?—Michael forced discipline. He let the men eat, drink, and catch their breath. A tired, thirsty search party was no good to anyone. Only when the worst of the noon heat had begun to pass did they move forward, rolling slowly up a crumbling ribbon of ancient asphalt.
The valley's entrance was a gash in the earth, flanked by high, rocky walls. And there, just as described, was a gate. Or the sad ghost of one. A lone, listing guard shack, its plastic windows long gone, stood sentry. A rusted metal pipe served as a barrier, currently lowered across the path. No one was visible.
Their guide, Steve, seeing his payday within reach, needed no urging. He scurried forward, a grin splitting his weathered face. "Hello! I bring visitors! Friends of Zhang Tiezhu!"
He was ten feet from the shack when a length of rebar, one end crudely sharpened to a wicked point, thunkedinto the hard-packed earth, embedding itself inches from his bare, calloused foot.
The move was followed by a rustle of movement. From behind piles of scrap, from shallow trenches dug into the dust, from the shadow of the shack itself, figures emerged. A dozen, maybe fifteen. They fanned out, holding an assortment of weapons: more sharpened rebar, pipes, a couple of ancient-looking rifles that might have been used at the dawn of industry.
Their leader stepped forward. He was tall and gangly, all elbows and knees, his voice cracking as he tried to project authority. He hefted another piece of rebar like a spear. "Halt, strangers! State your business!"
Michael's eyes swept over them, his initial relief at finding the place hardening into a new kind of shock. He recognized no one from Zhang Tiezhu's group. More startling was their age. Even by the Wasteland's harsh standards, which made adults of children, these were kids. Teenagers, some barely into their teens. They wore patched, ill-fitting clothes that might have once been military surplus, cut down to their small frames. Their faces, beneath the smudges of dirt and defiant scowls, held the soft, unformed lines of youth. But their eyes, as they stared down the armed convoy, were hard as flint.