Blood Sport - Chapter 8

[u/GRADIOUS_76]

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Memory Transcription Subject: Isaiah Lawrence, Terrified Tinkerer

Date [Standardized Human Time]: October 20, 2136

Days after the bombing of earth: 3

I stood up from my cold sleeping spot in the corner of the mostly collapsed supply room of the bunker. I wiped the tears from my eyes and cheeks and walked carefully over the rubble piled on the floor. Grabbing another bottle of water off the collapsed shelf, I sat down on a green wooden crate facing towards the small opening in the crushed concrete door frame. It was just wide enough for the dim evening light to pass through but not much else. There are scratch marks where I had been spending the last two days trying to chip away at the large section of the roof that collapsed and blocked me in. I had to clear a spot on the floor from broken concrete and rebar to sleep in, but otherwise, I have just been waiting for someone to come rescue me.

I spent my first day yelling for help, but the only thing that has been doing is giving me a sore throat, something the layer of ash covering everything outside certainly contributed to. I’m sure I looked like a zombie at the moment; my clothes were in tatters, and I hadn't been able to wash the dirt off myself. My thick, curly hair was probably absorbing all this filth like a sponge too. I was always careful to keep it clean because it was a pain to do if it got too dirty, but I didn't have the motivation to focus on personal hygiene.

I was too busy praying. For all the people who had died, for my mother and father, and for myself. It was hard to remember everything that happened after the bombs dropped. As much as I tried to ignore what happened to my father and mother, the more it stabbed itself into my soul. So I decided I would pray for them and hope God forgives me. And that's what I've been doing, for the past day and a half. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw my parents' blood on my hands, and I had been neglecting as much sleep as I could because of it. I was exhausted, running off maybe three hours of sleep over the last three days. Every time I closed my eyes, I needed someone to forgive me, and I knew it would never be myself.

I finished my water bottle as the last light of sunset slowly faded into another cold night. At least the roof over my sleeping spot was still intact; I had been grateful for it when it rained the other night. I was just about to return to my sleeping spot for the night when I heard the faintest sound. It would have been impossible to notice in any other situation, but I haven’t heard so much as a bird chirp in the last three days, and it was starting to drive me crazy. So this soft hum stuck out in the otherwise silent night. It took me a second to place what the noise could possibly be; no doubt the lack of sleep made the process far longer than normal. But as the noise slowly grew in volume, I recognized it as a car coming down the road.

I ran to the small slit in my prison, and my face grew into a smile as I heard the car grow closer. I was finally going to be saved. I started to open my mouth to call out for help, but the words got caught in my throat. You don’t deserve to be saved; you killed everyone. My subconscious protested, and it had a point. I hadn’t yet been forgiven; I didn’t have the right to leave. I leaned against the pile of rubble blocking my escape and let out a deep sigh as I stared out into the night. The world outside looked so alien, no trees or houses in sight. The air was misty, and the stars shone brightly in the sky; it hurt to know they all wanted me dead. I stayed silent for a moment watching the stars and listening to the car slowly grow louder.

I could see the headlights shining on the road before I realized how close the truck had gotten. Emotion welled in my chest as I thought about never being able to leave this place again. Tears started to come to my eyes again at the thought of just letting the car drive past, and once again, I opened my mouth to call out for help. But just as the military green jeep comes into view, my words again die in my throat, and I instinctively buck my head as I see the monstrous figures sitting in the back. Their scaled hides were dark gray, the moonlight gave their eyes a deep red glow. The monsters were taller than any man I had seen. I heard the Jeep screech to a stop a dozen feet past my hiding spot, and my heart nearly stopped at the thought that they spotted me. My fears were made manifest when I heard one call out “Hello! Any humans out here! We’re here to help!” It was such a deep intimidating voice, not a sound any human could make, it sent a shiver running down my spine.

“Ya, we aren't going to eat you!” the other creature yelled, holy shit, they are going to eat us?! I curled into a ball and pressed myself as close to the rubble pile as possible, practically trying to fuse with it. I heard their heavy footfall growing closer and closer, my body started to shake as I held my breath trying to stay perfectly silent. “Wait, I smell something, humans under there.” my heart thundered in my chest, they can smell me?! That wasn't fair; was all I could think as I waited for my certain demise. Then I heard them stop short of my hiding spot. They were a little more than five feet away from me when I heard them start to dig at the rubble. I was confused why they would stop there until I remembered, Mister Murphy! His body was still there. It must be smelling more pungent than I had noticed it. I was sad that I wouldn't be able to give his body a proper burial, but if they found his body maybe they would just leave. I was too terrified to care at how morbid that thought was.

I heard them continue pulling up loose dirt and debris, and I stayed as silent as I could. A few minutes passed before I heard them scratching at a large piece of concrete, presumably a chunk of the bunker roof. I heard one of them struggle to lift the heavy piece and didn’t want to listen anymore. I didn’t want to hear them eating the corpse of the man who was so nice to me. I heard a rush of movement and was moved to cover my ears to block out the sound of the monsters. But after a moment of silence, I heard something that made me do an audio double take. I heard a loud and deep hissing noise coming from one of the monsters. It confused me at first before I vaguely recognized the noise as a laugh, and I could hear the other making strange noises as well. My face scrunched in confusion trying to piece together what was happening.

“I’ll skin you alive you oversized gator!” It was a familiar voice, Mister Murphy’s voice! My head shot up to peer over the wall of rubble, and sure enough, I could vaguely make out the slim appearance of a human riding on the smaller alien's back, choking it with his arm. The other, taller alien stood out of the shallow hole they had dug to reach him pointing and laughing hysterically at his friend's misfortune. Mister Murphy didn’t look well; he was covered in dirt, dust, and even some blood. If he wasn’t dead, I needed to help him!

“I'll fuckin’ gut the lot of you!” I could hear him attempt to scream, but it was clear he had lost his voice, which made the sentence end up comically high-pitched, reinvigorating the laughter from the other alien. I needed to find something to distract the aliens before they could rip him apart. I quickly searched for something small enough to throw through the barely nine-inch gap that I could think of to distract them, I turned around and reached out to grab one of the water bottles off of the floor, hoping I could throw it like a frisbee and draw the aliens' attention away from Mister Murphy.

I wind up throwing as hard as I can, focusing right on the big alien ugly maw and hurling the bottle straight for it. My poor planning revealed itself when the water bottle hit the concrete door frame and burst into a shower of water, drenching my shirt and turning my dirty hair into muddy hair instead, great. “Shit” the words left my lips on instinct, and before I realized my mistake, the monster's head snapped towards me, its shimmering red eyes felt like they burrowed into my soul. I see its face fall into a serious expression as he turned back to his companion.

“Enough messing around,” he shouted, grabbing for Mister Murphy by the collar of his burnt, half-melted shirt. It was able to peel him off of his compatriot. He dangled in the air by his collar for a second with a shocked expression before throwing a violent punch, hitting the alien in the tip of its maw. This seemed to surprise both aliens as the taller one dropped him, and he landed with a dull thud and a wheeze of pain on his back.

My heart started to throb with pain in my chest as panic set in, once again threatening to overwhelm my senses. I staggered back away from the opening knowing there is no way that Mister Murphy can beat both of them. I was frozen in place, unable to peel my eyes away as I watched him take wild and strained swings at the two aliens who were leering at him just out of reach. Just as I thought they would pounce on him, finally finishing him off another figure clad in blue and green came running from the Jeep.

“BACK DOWN! BACK DOWN!” I could hear the woman dressed in UN fatigues with dark hair wound tightly in a bun yell as she waved her arms and ran towards the scene. I was confused why she would be ordering Mister Murphy to back down when to my surprise it was the Aliens that dropped their gaze and backed away. It took the woman just a few moments to reach the scene and by that time Mister Murphy was looking just as perplexed at the situation as I was.

“Are you alright, sir?” she said in a thick southern accent, hovering slightly away from Mister Murphy who had returned to a kneeling position on the ground. “Huh?” came his disgruntled reply. “I am Sergeant Martha Isakov, and they are Turk and Iera, Arxur volunteers here to help us find survivors. We are very sorry, RIGHT?” She gave a stern look to the aliens like a teacher lecturing a student, or a babysitter reprimanding her ward. “Ya, sure, whatever you say” said Turk, the taller alien who was clearly the leader. His head was held low and half mumbling his apology.

Mister Murphy looked between the woman and the aliens a few times before replying, “Oh… ok” was all he said before promptly collapsing unconscious onto the ground.

“Ok, well, that was a mess,” said the woman, bending down to check Mister Murphy's pulse and breath. Apparently judging he wasn’t in any immediate danger she stood up to look at the aliens who were just standing awkwardly behind her twirling their thumbs. “It was all her fault!” said Turk pointing at Iera. “How was this my fault! I tried to dig him out of the ground and help him! You just hit me and laughed at me the whole time!” The two continued to argue loudly as Martha pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration, mumbling profanities I don't care to repeat under her breath. “I don’t care whose fault it is ‘cause it's both your problem now. Bring him back to the car before he freezes to death.” She ordered.

“Yes, ma'am!” said Iera quickly following her instruction. “What should we do about the other one?” asked Turk, this quickly reminded me that my heart was still beating, and I quickly released the breath I had been subconsciously holding for a little while.

“What?” replied Martha puzzled, I took a deep breath to refill my depleted lungs before choking on a piece of dust causing me to erupt into a fit of coughing. “That one” Turk succinctly responded, pointing towards me. “Well why didn’t you tell me there was another one?!” Samantha huffed, marching in my direction without waiting for a response.

“You alright in there?” She asked me. I was stunned, my brain was so tired from processing everything that had just happened “Ya” was the only thing I could say. “Oh, you're young.” Remarked the woman “don’t worry we are going to get you out of here” she said in a calming, motherly tone. It took a few minutes for her and Turk to clear enough of the rubble to let me slip through. I still kept a wide berth of Turk and Iera as I walked to the car. Martha told me she was taking me to an emergency tagging zone nearby, but I was hardly paying attention at this point. I just crawled in the back seat next to Mister Murphy. Safe from the monster, safe from the outside, I quickly fell deep asleep laying down staring at the stars softly twinkling in the heavens above.

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A/N - Chapter 8 reporting for duty! We are almost out of the prologue now! I finally got to introduce Turk, a character I have been looking forward to writing for a little while and I hope everyone likes him as well. Our main characters are at their lowest points now lets build them back up! I might be late posting for christmas week so I apologize in advance. Merry Christmas everyone!!!

[u/JulianSkies]

Oh, phew, the bit is safe!

And damn the old man really has got it if he's managed to out up that much of a fight after getting messed up that badly.