Aberrant: Dead Rising - Path of Vengeance

[Forge]

Ass-tards.

They were. They were all a bunch of ass-tards. At least, that's how Vinny saw it, or Fuse, as everyone had taken to calling him. He didn't particularly dislike the name, but no one dared to say it to his face. Not since he'd shot Mitchell in the foot with one of his 'bullets' for doing that very thing.

Fuckin' pilots.

Vinny bumped the man of his thoughts in the shoulder as he passed him in the hall, nearly causing the man to drop his stack of paperwork. He was sure that his back was getting mental daggers, but he didn't care. He didn't care about much lately...

"Major!"

Vinny slowly stopped and turned around, sparing a glance down the hall where Mitchell was still trying to make Vin spontaneously combust with pure thought as he knelt to pick up a couple loose papers. Vin turned his attention back to the jogging form of Gopher who was red with perspiration and obviously in a hurry to find him.

"What is it, Walters." Vinny replied, not bothering to return the salute, his voice slightly slurred around the cigar.

"The General wants you."

"Which one?"

Vinny knew which one...Only one General was referred to as 'The', but he was hoping it wasn't, just on pure chance.

Hate that mother fucker. What shit work he need done now.

Walter's ignored the Major's snide remark and continued, "Some kids just came in with what was left of ZK-6, he has that look in his eye..."

"The fuck happened?"

"Not sure, they're still in the infirmary, Doc not letting anyone near them quite yet."

Prob some fuck'n yuppy zomb shits congregating like a fuckin' herd 'round some shithole. Dumbass-tards prolly went crawlin' in the fuck'n hole, stupid fucks.

"Fine."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"Wanted to see me General?" Vin said, quickly removing the cigar from his mouth and stuffing it in a pocket as he opened the door. This General was probably the last man that Vinny had any kind of fearful respect for. It wasn't that the man was physically imposing in any way, but the power and command under his control in the world as it was...It was enough to make a man wet himself.

"Yes, Major...I assume you've heard the latest?" General Nelson replied, sitting down in the executive leather chair with a file in his hand. The man was as imposing as anyone would have told, even with the 'tall-tale' exaggerations. Even in a post-apocalyptic time, his uniform was neatly pressed, as though even smudges or imperfections didn't dare to approach the man unless bidden.

"Got the gist..."

"Good...I need you to clean up." Nelson closed and dropped the file on his desk. He leaned back, folding his hands in to his lap. As much as it pains me to order the deaths of civilians, we can't have roving bands of lawless rednecks fucking around with our soldiers."

Sure you cry yourself to sleep, sir.

"A'right."

"I am confident in your ability to neutralize the situation, and assess the needs to complete their former mission?"

"Yeah."

"That's good to hear, Major. You can leave immediately. Your orders." He picked up another file and leaned over, offering it to Vinny who took it immediately.

Vinny turned, wanting to waste no time in leaving.

"One more thing Major..." Nelson said, steepling his fingers on his desk.

Vin turned his head back over his shoulder.

"Godspeed." The General said with a devilish smirk.

Vinny left without a response. Large chunks of ground being eaten by his large gait as he strode down the hall.

One day, you'll fuckin' eat your tongue for saying that, you royal fuckin' bitch.

[Forge]

When it was time to go, Vin wasted no time in gathering the few things he would need from his room that had also become his office. He traveled light and liked it that way. Less to worry about and less to get in the way. The one he did make sure of was his dwindling supply of cigars. He took two out and put them in a pocket before locking the case two times over and hiding it once again.

He was hoping that this mission might put him somewhere near or in a town that he could restock, but even then, what he often found was stale.

Sighing, he took his pack and left, locking his room on the way out to the elevator.

~~~~~~~~~~~

The steel doors opened, releasing Vinny onto the surface. The weather was mostly calm, a little cool, but he paid it no heed. Readjusting his pack on his shoulder, he kept a strong pace towards his goal of the motorpool, hoping to get a decent vehicle.

Once the world had gone to Hell, the military had made a point of scavenging any useful vehicle and 'appropriating' it for themselves. Considering that most of the owners were dead, and dealerships no longer had customers, there hadn't been a lot of protesting to this idea and this had resulted in quite the stock.

The ensuing months however, had taken a hard toll without proper repair shops or part suppliers and many vehicles had been turned into heaps of scraps as they were looted for parts for other vehicles.

At best, Vin was counting on some kind of Jeep or truck. Worst case scenario, he would get some luxury car with terrible off-road capabilities.

As he approached the fenced off parking lot, he saw a beat up old Nova hanging out in the general parking that was being searched over by a couple 'volunteers'. Vin's scowl turned even deeper as he saw who was watching over them...The man could make a pile of dog shit sound like a parfait.

"Simmons." Vin said, nodding.

"Hey asstard." Simmons smiled.

"Fuck you."

"Aren't you going to ask what I'm doing...?" Tyler asked, a charming splayed across his face.

Vin could care less, but he wasn't any less immune to Tyler than the next guy and Tyler knew it. The Major glanced at 'Mr. Right' and then back at the orange muscle car, "Not looting it?" he asked, as he watched guns being pulled out of the trunk.

"Not yet, this is just the security check. The General is trying to play nice with these two, get them to join up willingly...though it begs the question, 'why'..." Tyler's tone clearly indicated that he had no faith in the idea.

"Yeah, well, shit yourself to death with all that fun." Vin said, being civil. He started walking again after he realized he had stopped, the gate to the vehicles just beyond him.

Simmons frowned at his back and hurried to fall in step with Vinny, "Whereya headed?"

"Fuck your mama."

"Now Fuse, that was uncalled for. I've been nothing but nice..." Tyler frowned, looking hurt.

Fuse...fuckin' hate that name.

Vin stopped and turned towards Tyler, his face was red with suppressed rage, but he managed to smooth his features and put on a smile. He slowly let his pack fall from his shoulder and he set it down on the ground. Tyler stood there, his frown turning to a shit-eating grin as he saw the reaction from Vinny.

"Right...shouldn't have said that." Vin said, looking like he was going to have a stroke. "Shoulda just did this to begin with..."

The sound of the gunfire echoed off the walls of the mountain around them. The loud report causing the Nova's searchers to nearly piss themselves in surprise and drop to the deck. Simmons dropped to the deck, screaming in pain as he held his foot, blood pouring out of the hole that went clean through his boot.

Vin calmly picked up his pack, slung it back across his shoulder and turned back to get his ticket off the base.

Pinkie-waving pussy-bitch.

[Forge]

With cigar in hand and a wry smile on his face, Major Vincent Wright roared through the gates of Cheyenne Mountain just ahead of the message that said to not let him pass.

He had been lucky, this trip out, he had an old Jeep CJ, it even had a winch on the front with a hefty spool of cable. It probably wasn't the car he had been issued, but the keys were in the ignition and he had been in a hurry. It was a matte white where the paint hadn't flaked off, revealing a brown primer underneath. The rear bumper had been replaced with a raw piece of 4x10 lumber and the words, 'Git R Dun' spray-painted in a camo motif across its face. There was a long CB antennae that had one end attached to a hook on the roof, though upon trying, most channels were dead or looping 'SOS' messages.

Vin had the last known coordinates of the team who had tried to do their own rendition of Deliverance, complete with a description of the trailer where they were picked up. He felt it would be relatively easy to track down the roving band of horrific hicks and dispatch them quickly. Population density the way it was, he was thinking that there couldn't be more than a dozen of them at best, and some of those were sure to be women.

The cluster said he had a full tank of gas, which barring any unforeseen events, should get him to the site by morning if he drove straight through. It wasn't safe, in fact, it was terribly risky, but Vinny was hardly the type to be worrying about things that go 'bump' in the night and the roads out here had long ago been cleared or were simply empty to begin with.

The Major dug out a cassette from under the seat and threw it in the old player, not hardly glancing at what it was, but happy to listen to something. A satisfied smile appeared however, as Metallica's "Black Album" spooled up.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The moon was already low in the sky and the only sounds he heard were the gentle purring of the engine and the occasional clatter from supplies in the back as they shifted across the bare metal floor when he saw the cable too late. His foot shifted from gas to brake almost instantly, but it still wasn't enough time and he slammed into the pvc-coated wire at 70 miles per hour. The CJ was tall, and the placement of the cable was just so that it sent the car flipping end over end and then into a roll. Vinny was tossed around like a marble in an empty jar, never having bothered to secure his seatbelt.

The vehicle finally came to a rest off the road in the irrigation ditch, upside-down and against a telephone pole. The drive wheel was lazily spinning with unspent motion and hot liquid was hissing out of the punctured radiator. Vinny started to reflexively drag himself out the busted windshield, but hadn't made it farther than halfway way before the business end of a two barrel shotgun was in his face.

"Hot damn, caught us some meat fellas!"

Vinny dared to look up, but couldn't see anything in the darkness.

"Fuck you, ass-ta--"

With a sharp crack to his skull, the world went black.

[Forge]

Vinny woke with a start, gasping for air like someone who had just swam from the ocean depths and finally clawed their way to the surface. But Vinny was also a trained soldier and knowing very likely he was being held, he brought himself under control and stopped his thrashing in favor of stealth.

What was immediately apparent was the fact it was night and whatever he was laying in smelled like the pit at Cheyenne Mountain the military had begun to throw the (un)dead. There had simply been too many to bury and when they tried to burn them, that had only attracted more of the shambling corpses. Leaving them the unpleasant choice of finding somewhere to dump them. Fortunately, a steep ravine about a mile from the base entrance was now serving that purpose.

What the corn-shit those pig fuckers do?

Vin slowly slid his arms around trying not to think what exactly he was sliding through and over and propped his head up, glancing around as his eyes adjusted to the light given off by the moon and stars. The orange glow of a fire was reflecting off a surface in the distance to his left, dancing in his peripheral vision. He could just make out the sounds of talking, though the voices were muted by distance and terrain.

Asstards didn't tie me down? Fucking Christ, I'm hungry.

Vinny slowly pushed himself up, feeling none the worse for wear despite being knocked out. He slid his legs under himself and sat on his heels, slowly rotating around as he gazed into the night. As far as he could see, there didn't appear to be any structures or people. He was in a kind of depression in the landscape on top of a mound of what could only be bodies...or at least the remnants. The quantity of bones to decaying slime was too unbalanced. Six months ago, he would have been bowled over, heaving his guts at a situation like this, dry heaving himself to unconsciousness, but fortunately (or unfortunately) he had been hip deep in putrescence so many times since Zombigeddon that aside from revulsion and a desire for a bath, he was keeping his wits about him.

He half walked half slid down the pile until he reached soil. They had evidently scavenged his clothing along with his other belongings, but that was to be expected.

At least the shits didn't eat me...Gonna wish they did.

It took a bit of digging, but he eventually found a large broken bone, an arm or leg of some kind that he used to chip into the soil. He covered himself in the loose dirt, using it to absorb the disgusting slime. Once it had congealed into a cake-like substance he used the bone to scrap it off as best he could.

Like fuckin' Arnold. 'Come with me if you want to live.'

Vin nearly made himself laugh as he imagined holding a hand out to one of the pig-fucks in some twisted parody of the movie and then ripping it off and beating the asstard to death with it.

Cleaner than he had been, or at least less viscous than he had been, he searched for a couple more broken bones, easily finding a couple femurs with shattered ends. It was then that Vin noticed that all the marrow was missing and the bones had a texture to them that belied the smooth nature of skeletons. he ran his fingers along the depressions, taking care to examine them and held them up in the abundant night light.

Mother...fuckers.

As he went around and examined more bones around the edge of the pile, it became clear that whoever it was that had captured him, they'd been hungry and weren't restricting their diet to four-legged critters.

Sick shits.

His anger burgeoning beyond the bounds of his capture at the atrocities these people were doing, Vinny quietly starting approaching closer to the camps, bone daggers in hand, taking care to avoid anything that might make a sound. If anything, he had time to exact vengeance on the cannibals. He inched closer and closer towards the orange glow, able to now make out a circle of fifth wheels and trucks that had a makeshift canvas & tarp roof over the lot of it, blocking most of the light. Vinny couldn't see anyone, but if these people had survived this long, they hadn't done it by not leaving a guard out at night.

As he creeped in closer, wishing for cover in the barren landscape, he finally heard what he had assumed, someone awake. The guard sounded like he was inside the ring of vehicles. Vin was just starting to make out conversation, apparently one-sided, as he came within twenty feet of the closest vehicle, a Ford F-150, early 2000 model.

Oh darlin', you're so sexy. Its ok, freein' ya from the asstards won't take long.

He crept up, making sure to keep himself in line with the tires of the lifted truck. Vinny crouched down and looked very slowly around the side of the tire underneath the Ford.

From one end to the other, it appeared to be about fifty yards. There were a dozen large campfires, most were dark or smoldering, but one was burning strong. At it, sat the person Vinny had heard. It was a large man in mechanic's coveralls, he had a red do rag tied over his head, but long stringy hair was escaping and he had a large bushy beard that looked like it hadn't seen a comb or even a stroking hand in months. He was sitting in a folding lawn chair opposite the fire from Vinny. The object of his attention, and apparently conversation, was a large dog...a very large dog. If an Irish Wolf Hound and a Bear Mastiff bred and then took HGH, it would probably look something like this dog did.

"Fuuuck." Vin whispered under his breath, but that was all it took. The dog leaped up from where it had been laying next to the 'mechanic' and started growling in Vinny's direction, slowly taking steps to approach, its fur starting to stand on end.

"What is it, Rex? We got us some walkers out thar?" The man asked, standing up and grabbing a rifle that had been leaning against his chair on the far side.

Think fast.

Vin grabbed a rock and threw it backwards over his head as far as he could into the camp and he heard it bang off something metal.

Yeah, that helped.

Vin risked another look and saw the man and dog both having turned towards the sound to investigate. Vinny dropped his daggers and took careful aim, sweat beading over his body as he concentrated. Moments later, he finally let loose, his shot silent from the effort, but the dog moved at the last second and the force blasted into the man's hip, disintegrating it into shredded screams.

The dog immediately started barking, competing with the mechanic's screams as to which was the louder alarm.

"Shit."