Bolt-Action: 1
Beyond Here Lies Nothin’
It didn’t take as long as they thought to get the smell of dead bodies out of the air or at least that’s what my father would say before he died like the others…
Dylan sits perched on top of the crumbling skyscraper barely sixteen he was still a child in his mother’s eyes. He was joined by his childish friends. Theo who he considered an absolute waste of space, which always seemed amusing since his obesity caused him to literally take up the most space. Jackson was a wiry bound ball of nerves kept heavily medicated with prescription pills.
These were his friends. There weren’t many other choices.
Jackson takes aim at the street below gripping firmly to his assault rifle as he glares through the scope. He quietly taunts his prey. “Come on a little closer. Come on.”
Theo peers off the side of the building. “You’re not going to kill him. You’re going to miss like you always do.”
“Shut up, Theo.” He pulls the trigger. BANG!
“A miss! Told you.”
Jackson quickly moves his rifle firing again. BANG!
“Oh my God, another miss!”
BANG! BANG! BANG! The shots ring out at an almost deafening pitch.
“Did I get him?”
Theo looks down at the street and then starts laughing hysterically his belly bouncing up and down with each laugh. “Seriously just give up, man. Hey Dylan, show him how it’s done.”
Dylan picks up an old, bolt-action rifle – the only remaining possession to prove his father’s existence on this world. Without a word, he stares into his scope.
Green tinted crosshairs scour the cavernous craters left in the asphalt. Something twitches ever so slightly from under the black tar.
He readies himself only the wind a distraction now. His shooting finger gently caresses the trigger as he waits for his shot.
A Feeder scurries from his hiding place into plain sight. It is a frightening large trilobite-like parasite. Its antennas twinge and without warming Dylan squeezes the trigger. BANG!
The Feeder doesn’t even put up a fight. It was an instant Kill Shot.
“Damn it, Dylan. You don’t even make it look like fun.”
That’s because to him it wasn’t. This was just the life they lead now.