Outside Those Walls

The giant gates of the walled city opened slowly. The sound of the steel sliding could be heard for miles away. An alarm went off in the city and the guards put on their gas masks, ran to the gates and secured the immediate area around it.

That is how each story of the famous Stalkers began. Stalkers were respected, praised and loved by the people. How could they not be? They went out in the poisoned and dangerous world to fetch vital things that the people needed to survive in their closed cities.

Their armour was also a sight to behold. A gas mask that was also a helmet, armour that was tough, yet souple and then the guns. Each Stalker had his self-made gun and always had a whole story to tell about it. Like how they met a monster who could spit acid out of his mouth at rapid speed, which is how one of the Stalkers got his idea of making some similar weapon, but with shooting metal instead of acid.

“What? The parts of the water filtration system broke again? You know the materials are getting harder and harder to find, right? Take care of them!” I saw a man saying to the old owner of the Water Filtration System.

“I don’t care that you’re one of the Stalkers, we need these parts at any cost to survive! And we can’t afford to send out a group of warriors. The defense of the city will be insufficient and they might get killed the second they step out!” The old man answered to the guy. He was a Stalker?!

“Fine, but this will be the last time I will go out for free. I need to get paid so I can eat.” The Stalker replied with his heavy voice and headed off to prepare. I secretly followed him. Maybe he would be my chance out of this boring town! I'm sick of being the unappreciated boy who has to do all the hard work.

The alarm went off and everyone took shelter except for the guards, who put on their gas masks and ran to their position to cover the opening of the gate. The Stalker headed off and the steel doors were closed again. The Stalker looked around, and then he noticed me, a young boy aged seventeen, standing next to him. I prepared myself with a gasmask and my clothes that couldn’t protect me against any attacks, but it did protect me against the more dangerous gasses by making sure my skin was not in contact with the air.

Completely surprised by this, the Stalker dropped his double barrel shotgun, which he was reloading.

“What’s the meaning of this?! Are you crazy?!” the Stalker yelled in my face, but then he lowered his voice dramatically “What do you think you are doing? Do you want to die?”

“You’re the one yelling.” I answered calmly, but I couldn’t hide the excitement in my voice. “Relax, I just want to help. Let me become a Stalker too!”

The Stalker bent down to pick up his shotgun and remained silent for a while.

“Stay alive long enough.” The Stalker responded eventually and reloaded his shotgun while silently walking forward and looking around for any danger.

“Will do!” I replied with a smile. Now, everyone in every town will respect me and my life won’t be as boring anymore.
”I’m Kleas by the way. Kleas Razog.” I told him, just to get on friendly terms with him.

The Stalker crouched and looked at me while he gestured that I had to do the same and come closer.

Obediently I followed the silent orders and waited for an explanation.

“I don’t care, boy.” The Stalker said to me flatly “Do you have a gun, or not?”

A little shocked by his harsh, uncaring attitude, I got my only pistol out of my pocket and showed it to him.

“Quite an old gun you got there…” he sighed. “It’ll have to do. You watch my back, boy, and don’t make any sudden movements or sounds.”

I nodded once and we started to advance. Together we silently crouched our way over to an ominous-looking building in the distance. The way there was quite rugged, having to step over and avoid the debris of broken buildings. To the right I saw a black smoke hang over an area. Or was it blue? Either way, it certainly did not seem healthy, so I’m glad we didn’t have to go that way.

As we got closer, I looked around even more, eager to see how the buildings used to be before the Fall. I noticed piles of rubble every so often around the whole terrain with a barely visible road in between that went into the big building. I wonder how it looked like in the past. It must have been great, with all these ‘trees’ and ‘grass’ along the grey roads I used to read in books.

As we got to the big building, I inspected it’s state. The building itself was in a surprisingly well kept state, but the entrances were blocked. We had to go through the smaller building that was connected, which was not as lucky to stay in a good state, if we wanted to enter.

“What is this place?” I asked the Stalker, trying to look for any clue what this building was used for.

“This was where they used to build ‘cars’. The pieces we’re looking for were used in factories like this often. Keep your eyes open for anything alive. I will search for the parts we need.” The Stalker responded while he was inspecting the inside of the small collapsed building and the open door leading into the factory.

I slowly peered inside the factory, but I couldn’t see very much. The Stalker suddenly gestured to follow him. He was still crouched, but I had to stretch a little before we went on. I’m not used to crouching at all. The Stalker went in and I hurried after him when I was done. Suddenly, I was amazed at the huge, although mostly broken, machines here. I saw a small hallucination of how things used to be here. The vision seemed so real… People were tinkering on a big metal shape, adding parts. The big machines helped them by moving around the shape, adding parts itself, or helping the people move around easier.

Being absolutely distracted, neither me nor the Stalker noticed the black creatures that were silently moving sideways to flank the two unwary scavengers that were carelessly wandering in their territory.

Bump. The sound of the Stalker hitting the back of my head echoed a little through the room and I remembered why we were here. Together, we snuck further around in the big room trying to be as silent as possible, but sadly, I often hit a rusted piece of metal while trying to crouch forward, yet also looking behind me, sideways, under and above me for any possible threats and thus made quite a lot of noise.

Shh… Cghh… Shh…

Plup… Plup… Plup….

“Ehm, S-Stalker? I think we’re not alone. I think I hear small breathing and a sound like the falling of Cloud Drops...” I whispered to the Stalker, who was looking for the last part that they needed behind him. I did not even try to hide the fear in my voice. It should make the Stalker even more aware of the problem we have.

The Stalker immediately stopped making any sound and started to listen intently to any sound. I tried to be as silent as possible, but I had quite the trouble breathing quietly. My throat also suddenly got very dry, and I couldn’t say anything without a huge effort.

Suddenly a flash of light blinded me and a small explosion blasted its way into my senses.

I cried out in surprise and shortly after, I let out another cry as I saw a black monster which was some sort of cross between a rat, a cat and a ferocious dog.
The Stalker grabbed the collar of my sweater and pulled me up on my feet.

“Fire, boy! Fire! Don’t let the Gerlas get closer!” the Stalker shouted at me as he was doing aiming, shooting and reloading at an amazing speed, but he could hardly land a blow at these fast, agile creatures of darkness.

Then, a loud hissing sound started to come out of the darkness. Turning to the direction it came from, a much bigger Gerlas, which was the name of the species, appeared seemingly out of nowhere and jumped at the Stalker, biting his arm off, clawing his gas mask off of him and almost crushing him with his weight.

I tried to shoot the big one that was on the Stalker after taking his shotgun, but the little ones prevented me from changing my attention from them. After two shots, and two lucky kills, the shotgun was empty and useless, as I didn’t have the ammo. I took my pistol again and aimed at the big Gerlas.

“Just run…” The Stalker breathed with a lot of effort, knowing that the beast would go after me as soon as he was dead.

I wanted to run, but my knees were frozen to the place I was and they were shaking like crazy. I pinced myself to get back to my senses and it worked. I quickly ran to the outside. I looked behind me once and saw the last little Gerlas following me. He jumped at me, mouth wide open and almost bit my left leg, but suddenly a big bird swooped down, grabbed it and flew away.

I did not even think about it of stopping after what happened. I just kept running and running and running back in the direction where the town was.

I was completely out of breath and had a hard time inhaling fresh air as there was a very small crack in my gasmask. Not lethal in small dose, but still dangerous.

Some thirty steps away from the gates, I fell on my knees, which felt heavy as steel right now. I would have collapsed there, but the adrenaline and fear kept me from staying there.
I dragged myself forward with both my hands, growing weaker every second.
Almost…
I was almost at the gates.
My left arm had no strength left anymore, so I was now crawling forward with only my right hand and my chin.
The pain of the hard dirt and stones were nothing in comparison with the terrible world that was out here. I had to get to safety!
After finally reaching the gates, my right arm had a lot of tingling in it and I could not move it anymore.
Desperately, I headbanged the doors, hoping to make a sound hard enough for the guards to open the gates and drag me in.
The gas that was leaking in my gasmask were slowly poisoning and numbing all of my senses. Shortly after I reached the gate, I fell unconsious..
The last thing I heard was the alarm go off in the city and the sound of Cloud Drops, falling out of the clouds, burning a path into the ground.

If only I wasn’t so selfish as to set out and try to impress her.. That attractive girl who was only interested in adventurous, brave men, not the kind that's boring and does filthy and underpaid work…


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