part two is here! and i am excited to see how things go. Today I am following up where Angela Cavanaugh left off in her story “Wasteland” click here to see her spot: http://angelacavanaugh.com/2015/02/08/flash-fiction-wasteland/
Here is part two and i will be following this story as it progresses so if you pick this up i would appreciate a link in the comments.
Thanks!
Wasteland Part 2
“AAAGGH” God damn door, god damn rain god damn this piece of shit world.
Here I lay in fucking agony, turns out coughing up blood and nausea is only the beginning of my death. Now it’s my bones. They feel like rubber and when I use them it is the worst pain imaginable. It’s like twigs bending and I am waiting for it to break. Even lying in this ruin is killing my ribs and breaking through that door… go damn it.
Oh the irony, earlier I said “thank god for these clouds, else the sun would fry me” or something along those lines. Turns out, the clouds where due to rain, rain its black thick acid on me and the world below like acid straight from a kettle.
Had to get inside, and just my luck, a hospital made with reinforced brick, or what’s left from a hospital. I got in just before the down pour, saw the rain coming towards me and I ran. I thought my body was going to give in and let death happen but no. I won’t allow that. Not yet.
Oh and guess who owns this place. The same fucks who nuked it. Ha ha.
Anyway, one days walk, close but their fortress is still a spec on the horizon. But so long as I am here, I need food, water and some god damn pain killers.
Good news is in my profession, I see the hospital walls more than most. Hell had a friend here who dealt with some bodies for me. I was killing for the organisation and they were happy to help clear up. Also not so much a friend as that quiet loner working in the morgue. Not like he’s alive now. Chances are he got the same treatment as me.
What was his name again…? Jimmy…John? Began with J… anyway like I was saying I’ve been here before. They patched me up, for a price. Insurance isn’t the best when you kill for a living. So I know where I am going.
Fortunatly the drugs where secure behind a locked door on the lower level. So it wasn’t damaged by the bomb. Unfortunately the nurse station is a few floors up which is blown to hell. So I am stuck with the locked room. I need to find the ke-
You are shitting me? HA!
A fully automated health pod. Like they would have living doctors in their city. But to have a health pod here?
Let’s see. It a glass egg with a bed in it, some robot arms, tubes and needles. The console was still on. I hit the screen and it responds by opening up. Hm quiet comfy, it’s better than a hospital bed that’s for sure. Let’s see. Activate.
The thing closed up on me and then a female voice came on.
“Hello and welcome to the fully automated health care unit. We are scanning your body for injuries, ailments and other issues. Please stay calm and if needed please hit the emergency button to see a doctor.” The voice tells me.
“Warning! Warning! Radiation levels critical, severe radiation sickness detected. Would you like a complete analysis of your symptoms?”
“Yeah and some morphine or something.”
“Please hold… symptoms include, skin degradation, skin cancer, lung and trachea damage, bone cancer and bone marrow degradation. Lung cancer-“
“I did smoke prior apocalypse so…”
“If untreated you will experience: hair loss, second degree burn, immune system failure, organ failure and death. Fortunately this pod is fitted with pain killers, stem cell treatment and nano biotic medicines. Would you like us to treat you now?”
“God yes!”
“Very good, please insert your health insurance gold plus card into the monitor and we will begin.”
“You’re shitting me?”
“Negative. If you do not have the suitable insurance I am afraid we will not be able to help you. We recommend talking to a do-“
By then I smashed my fist into the monitor and cut off.
Being rich
Nuking the planet
And then expect insurance for health care.
“Fuck me I am dead. GOD DAMN IT!!”
It’s then I notice him.
I turn round and who do I find by Jimmy, or Johnny or whatever. Still wearing the white coat and a stethoscope round his neck. Or at least I thought it was around his neck.
It was actually melted into his neck, along with his skin, he looked like a zombie, shuffling and moaning in pain. His hair was gone. Only bleeding, pussy, burned skin. Yellow mixed with red seeping into the white coat.
I didn’t freeze up or anything but I was shocked. I stepped back and reached behind my back for my gun.
“Hey… man” he said. Or wheezed. “What’s ah? How are you-“
“Alive? Storm shelter.” I answered. Exhaustion filed my body and my voice started to drip.
I feel my grip loosen, I was relieved he was in there. Or I didn’t care. My arms were getting weaker.
“Do you have the ke-” that’s when I started coughing. Coughing and coughing until my through was raw. I couldn’t get a breath and then-
Then a puked my guts out.
Not a metaphor. Literally puked my guts out. Thick red puke came from my mouth like someone opened a shaked up can. Yellow, red and then red bits came out of me.
And then I passed out.
Addys completly normal blog 