Vangie combated the eerie silence of the street, the neighborhood, and the moon by remembering as many of D.I. Collins’ zingers back in boot. If they were out of step while marching, Collins would drop a random Mary Jane to the ground in a flash and yell out: “This ain’t a prom! This ain’t a night out on the town with Harry J. Herpes! Hit the deck and give me fucking twenty!” Of course, there wasn’t a deck anywhere nearby on the old training course. That was just U.S. Navy jargon. And the good old times, the times when Collins would work the platoon line as they stood at attention, heels exactly an inch away from their moldy-green sea chests. “Color me a motherfucker,” she’d yell out, “that sea chest ain’t in line with your heels, Mary Jane! Get out my way! What are you hiding?” Collins would of course rudely help herself, flipping the lid open, spilling out the contents of “Mary Janes'” personal effects. “Holy Fucking Mother Mary! How many tampons do you need, Mary Jane?”
And so on, and so on.
Scope left. Up slowly, down slowly, nada. The old town rested in peace tonight. Hell probably every night. I’m starting to think this town has been ravaged. She thought about the desiccated shroom stalk from hell down below in the commons. What significance did it play? Could it have led to the deaths of the family that owned this home? Poison shroom spores? Poison dust? Note to self, you need to get the hell out of this house by morning anyway.
Before dawn opened her rosy eyes, Vangie did spy something. A silver trail arcing down from the sky. Quick, so damned quick. If she wasn’t looking, the star trail would have evaded her eyes. But she was scope on. She watched it flash down blocks away. No explosion, just a WUMPF!
Upon her exit, Vangie found it easier to walk the spine of the roof, duck walk down the slope, hop onto the roof of the attached garage in the backyard, and then drop to the ground. No dog. Good stuff. Hate to grease a rover. She soldiered along, slinging her rifle on her shoulder. Best she could tell, downtown was south of her location, and south of the odd object and its WUMPF!
All was quiet.
She came upon a Quick Mart just before the street gave up the downtown area. Shrugging, she walked in, electricity still working inside. Nothing and nobody. Not even a racoon. She absolutely adored trash pandas, but she would shoot one if they “got down with the sickness” and turned on her. Candy, candy, candy. Bingo! Honey buns on the end cap. The coffee in the urn was ice cold. Not befitting an officer of Uncle Sam’s finest.
But Uncle Sam had caught the hound out of town when the weirdness began two years ago. Change of address: 1103 Ape-shit Ave. In care of Happy Farms. Vangie licked the wrapper of the honey bun when she finished, wondering if Saint Laura would accuse her of being a Navy vag licker. Probably. Folding the wrapper, she tucked it into her cargo pocket. Hard core. No pickup duty for me.
The care-bear boxes awaited neatly in the middle of Main, parachutes clumped on the deck like dead flower petals. Fucking flyboys and their jokes. Middle of Main. Each box was made of some obscene mixture of plastic poly-what-the-hell carbons and high-grade steel framing. Popping the top, she found medical supplies. Boxes of water decontaminates, bandages, pain relivers, and a leather pouch that unrolled to reveal emergency surgery tools. Let’s hope nobody needs an amputation. She fingered a glimmering bone saw.
Box two held no Bofas sitting on a sofa.
Just boxes and boxes of military grade food stuff.
If there’s military cheese in here, I’ll shoot my eye out.
A nearby undead Otasco store, complete with an attached repair bay, became the sacred receptacle of the Bofa boxes. Working like a born-again Mary Jane, Vangie humped the shit, medical supplies first, into the back of the store behind the service counter. Can’t have Harry J. Herpes stealing the good stuff. Bound to be an addict in this town some-fucking-where. Next, she slung the boxes of mystery chow into the back storeroom, scanning first for any Bofas that might say “boo” to her. She was a little depressed there was nothing back there but spare spark plugs, tires, and tools. No military cheese that I can see. But we have plenty of water, water stored in cute little pint-sized pouches. Betcha those are from Japan.
Toward noon she broke out a protein pack from her pack. Mmm, lovely lab-grown ham sandwich, a mini-bag of chipped up jerky, Japanese mango-tea and a vitamin C pill. But no fucking mini-Snickers. She sat eating with her rifle propped up next to her. She wasn’t taking any chances. Could be mushroom dogs, or mushroom people shuffling about, desiccated and gross. Tentacles on top of their head of course.
But by dusk, when she was gathering up the chutes, there was a glimmer out by the wall to the west, a sort of quicksilver wink humping in the dusk like a worm. She picked up her rifle, training her scope out west to get a better look.
And that’s when the silvery mass stood up and looked back at her.