It takes nearly an hour for the decontamination team to declare me clean enough to leave. As soon as the leader gives me the green light, I immediately move back towards the Chinook that brought me here. I call Lieutenant McKinley.

  “Lieutenant, how’s the material hand-off situation coming? I picked up some more items of interest.”

  “Almost done. We’ll be ready by the time you get back from the next Fracture. Don’t worry, we’ll have enough room for all of it. I requisitioned quite a lot of cargo space. Send me a list of what else you’ve picked up.”

  McKinley browses the data I send her in response, and I listen to the radio, looking for updates. Another Fracture has formed on the West Coast, in Sacramento. Most of the detected Fractures have formed in larger cities, though by now it’s more than clear that while they tend to form in larger cities, there are still some that form away from human civilization. Rural farming towns and cities near national parks have reported attacks from monsters, though all of them are different from the ones I have experience with.

  It seems Fractures that form in cities versus outside of them tend to produce different kinds of creatures. Whatever environments they form internally is completely unknown at this point. If anyone has entered more rural Fractures, they’ve never returned.

  Now with rural areas under threat, farms are being abandoned in record numbers. Those in more outlying towns are turning to cities to find safety, yet finding none. The flow of food is slowing, and the logistical network that America relied on is crumbling. Long highways, once safe, are now dangerous.

  A pack of especially large wolves might be little threat to a 16 wheeler, but a bear four times the size of a normal one certainly is. The only saving grace is that monsters seem to have little care for human constructions, like bridges, roads, or rail lines. Instead their hunger is reserved for human flesh.

  It’s moments like these that really sell the scale of what’s happening. It’s an apocalypse for sure, just a slow moving one. Everything our way of life relied on is crumbling around us. We had tamed the world through steel and concrete. Now, it fights back with monsters made of the very same materials that let us conquer it in the first place.

  Everything I do feels like I’m trying to bail out the Titanic. Despite the feeling of powerlessness, I have to keep trying, keep moving, keep fighting. It’s what Mom and Dad would have done.

  I splice into the Chinook’s pilot frequency as we take off.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Washington Global Education, it’s a school for ambassadors’ kids and the like.”

  “ETA?”

  “Ten minutes.”

  “Can we go any faster?”

  I can see the pilot give his co-pilot a look through the cargo hold’s hull.

  “I can try. Hold onto to something.”

  Eight and a half minutes later, the pilot lands us in a large field attached to the school, cargo door already open. I jump out before the heavy lift helicopter even touches down, dropping twenty feet before sprinting off for the Fracture.

  After dashing into the Fracture, sword in hand, I find myself in a warped and twisted version of the school. Smoke billows out from shattered buildings, and I can hear screams and gunshots from inside a central building. With an earth-shattering boom, I launch high into the air, and slam down onto the concrete outside the main building. I charge through the doors too small for my bulk.

  They rip off their hinges with a scream, taking chunks of the concrete wall with them, and the entire building creaks ominously. Each step inside pulverizes the tile. The ceiling lights flicker as they slowly die, sending strange shadows in the dimly lit school.

  Like the NAVSEA Command building, this too is oddly warped. The hallways are too tall, and the lockers are stacked three layers, far beyond the reach of even adults. Despite my immense height, I struggle to reach the highest lockers. The hallway itself twists oddly, like a piece of licorice. I can still hear screams, though underneath them, clacking noises, like metal claws on tile.

  I peak into the first classroom I find, only to find it almost entirely empty. The entire floor is one giant city-map carpet. In the center are twelve chairs sized for kindergarteners, set in two rows of six. They face towards me, the empty seats almost accusatory. The walls are covered in posters, though most of them are completely illegible, more smears of colors with vague shapes than actual posters. Only one is readable, and it lies on the wall behind the empty, jeering chairs.

  Don’t be late to school! It says.

  I jerk away and keep moving. The screams— and the metal claws— grow louder. I open another door, peaking into another classroom. The floor is tile and carpet, like a checkerboard. In the center is a circle of paper cut out people with their hands connected. All their heads are torn off and red paint coats the ground underneath them.

  Another taunting poster looks at me.

  ‘I am responsible’, it says. Beneath that lies an image of me, sword in hand.

  ‘I save people when they are in trouble’ captions my portrait.

  Red paint splattering over it leaves nothing else legible.

  I slam the door hard enough to bend the frame.

  As I back away and shakily move down the hall, I notice that this Fracture seems darker, harder to see through the other ones I’ve been in. Even the smog-choked chemical bath Fracture in the NAVSEA Command Compound was easier to see through than whatever strange murkiness clouds my vision. Before I can think more deeply on it, the source of the screams comes clattering around a corner.

  It’s a strange, six legged creature. It has a snout like a wolf but without a tail. The whole thing is made of black metal, and has rifle attachment rails haphazardly strewn all over it. The screams come from two speakers embedded in the back, and they cut out as soon as it sees me. Four green eyes, like night vision goggles lock onto me.

  It opens its mouth, and a gunshot rings out. Buckshot bounces off my armor, and I move into action. I have to move slowly to keep from collapsing the entire building, and that gives it time to get more shots off.

  Between each shot, the creature twitches oddly, like it’s trying to cough something up. Buckshot continually pings off my armor, and the ricocheting pellets shred lockers, notice boards, and paper strewn across the walls. It manages to fire several shotgun blasts before I get close enough to thrust at it.

  It skitters away, and with a heave I turn my thrust into an awkward slash, and I catch it in the ribs. The speakers screech with feedback before falling silent, and the monster falls apart, twitching in a pool of gun lubricant.

  As I give the remains a quick once-over, I notice that there’s a sawed-off shotgun at the back of the mouth, though there’s no trigger mechanism, just a single firing pin. The coughing motion racks another shell and slams it onto the firing pin.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Slam-Fire Beast is as good a name as any.

  A handful of Slam-Fire Beasts come skittering around a corner. One barges out from a classroom, its jaws dripping with blood. Scraps of cloth are struck in-between the jagged, brass teeth.

  As I focus on it, the world slows down to a crawl. The hungry monsters, mouths wide and mid-cough freeze in the air. Everything I am is focused on that one monster. With the focus, the blood vanishes, like it was something I had only thought I saw. The pink fabric, ripped apart and jammed in the vicious maw vanishes similarly. A trick of the mind. Still, it seems… odd.

  Despite the oddity, the monsters are still very much here, and I turn my attention back to them. The world speeds up as I relax my focus, and I charge into the horde.

  They try to get away, but I’m large enough that they can’t get around me. Their brass claws skitter and screech along the tiled floor. A few quick steps has me in range. A sweep cuts two in half. I snap out with a hand, and force a maw closed mid-cough. The Slam-Fire Beast blows its own face off, and it dies with a squeal of static.

  One tries to get around my bulk anyway, and I hip check it into a bank of lockers. It shatters in tune with the steel lockers, and shrapnel peppers the survivors. Buckshot pings off my armor like rain, and with a kick, I punt another down the hall. It unsteadily comes to three legs, the others useless wrecks. It starts to limp its way back to me. I stomp on the last waist high monster, and move towards the wounded survivor.

  A child’s laugh has me whipping around, and behind me I catch the barest hint of a pink shirt dipping around a corner.

  There shouldn’t be any children in here. There’s no way any of them entered the Fracture, right?

  I reach out with my sensors, only to find nothing. Anything beyond line of sight is entirely blocked by something. That damned, unseen murkiness is clouding my vision. For the first time in years, I feel claustrophobic and lost.

  The store shelves tower high, high over me. I fumble for a bright orange plastic bottle. Once my tiny hands get a grip on it, I turn around to look for Mom, only to find she’s not there. Panic flood through me.

  I tear off through the hallways, looking for whoever dipped around the corner. I should know that it’s not a lost child. I tell myself it’s just some other horrid monster in these god-forsaken nightmarish anomalies. The problem is?

  I didn’t check. I just ran in. Maybe there is someone in here.

  Kids can be stupid. They can get lost so easily. Go places they shouldn’t. Especially when they’re afraid.

  I take a corner too fast, and I rip up the floor as I try to change directions. The floor gives way beneath me with a scream that sounds uncomfortably like a person, and I slam into a bank of lockers. I punch all the way through the lockers and the wall behind into another room.

  Instead of a classroom, it looks like someone grabbed a chunk of Costco and dropped it here. On top of a concrete floor are two shelf-towers that reach far beyond my sight, looming in the darkness. Huge pallets of cookies fill the lower shelves of both. A tiny orange plastic bottle peaks out from behind a half empty pallet.

  My tiny heart flutters in my chest, and I look for Mom, but I can’t find her. I check another aisle, and I see a woman with short brown hair looking at something. I can’t see her face, but I know it’s Mom. My heart leaps with relief and I sprint over to her.

  “Mom! Mom!” I grab onto her leg, and she looks down at me. The panic comes rushing back, ten times worse than before. It’s not Mom. The woman bends down with a smile but it’s not Mom. I tear off in fear, eyes blurring with tears.

  I slowly back away from the towering shelves before sprinting down the hall again. Another giggle, another flash, another corner. I chase and chase and chase. A boot goes through the floor, and I go tumbling again. I slam against a wall, and a row of lockers fall onto me.

  I dive through aisle after aisle looking for Mom but I can’t find her. It doesn’t take long before the fear takes its toll, and exhaustion tugs at my legs. I slip behind a pallet of cookies, blue packaging beckoning me. I rest my head against the carboard packing, just for a moment.

  I clamber to my feet, lights flickering oddly again. I get the feeling of something clawing at me, nails against the spine I lost less than two weeks ago. I look down and only see shadows, twitching in the dying, strobing ceiling light.

  Another giggle and a flash of pink around yet another corner pulls my attention away, and I sprint off again. As I round the corner, I find a long hallway, filled with dozens of Slam-Fire Beasts.

  I go to charge through them. I can see a flash of pink two hundred yards down the hall.

  How did she make it that far? She couldn’t have. That can’t be a person.

  I go to crumple that thought up before pausing.

  Where am I?

  As I look around and try to figure out exactly where I am after my mad dash, the giggle turns into a blood curdling scream. I bolt down the hall, buckshot bouncing off my armor.

  I bulldoze through the horde of monsters. I back hand one, ripping its head off. I pick up another and ram it through four of its allies before crushing a fifth with the broken, dripping corpse. Dozens more turn to scrap underneath my boots and bulk.

  I find myself at the end of the hallway, a charnel house of broken monsters behind me. I look for the pink flash again, though part of me rebels against that instinct.

  No one’s here. Whoever that is, it’s not a person.

  An unbidden, greasy memory slides into my mind.

  A pink shirt, covered in blood. Her mother lying next to her. Her dad, what’s left, anyway, is ten steps behind. They were my responsibility.

  Nails dig into a spine I no longer have, looking for something that isn’t there. I groan and fall to a knee, head in my hands. Something hurts. I’m not sure what. Like a phantom pain, something I no longer have is screaming in agony. Shadows flicker cruelly in the ceiling lights, and looking down, I finally notice something I’ve missed.

  The shadow of what?

  Cruel looking shadowy tendrils dig into my own shadow, and more greasy thoughts slide in unbeckoned.

  I wake up when someone jostles the crate my head is lying on. I gasp and turn around, peaking through a gap. It’s Mom! I scramble out from behind the palette, and slam into her. I grip her tightly, burying my face in her worn jacket. She smells like home… and blood?

  I look up, and blood drips from glazed eyes. Her face is swollen, battered, and bruised. I struggle to get away, her ribs now clearly crushed. A missing leg has been replaced with pitch black shadow. She grips me tighter, and blood pours from her mouth as she struggles to speak through a badly broken jaw.

  “Where…were… you?”

  I scream and kick at her, but I’m so confused. Mom would never hurt me.

  She lifts me up to eye level as my tiny, legs kick the air. I’m too short. I’m so much taller now.

  “Needed. You. Died. Screaming.” She gurgles out.

  *She pulls me in and goes to bite me. I stick my arm out, in a vain attempt to ward her off. My gangly wrist disappears down her nightmarish gullet. It’s too small. I’m so strong now.

  *She bites down, blinding pain lances up from my wrist. With a crunching sound, she tears off my hand. It disappears into her maw, and my blood coats her face. Her dead eyes gleam in delight and satisfaction. This isn’t right. I’m not made of meat. I don’t bleed. This is a dream. Mom would never hurt me.

  I come to, laying on shattered linoleum tile. As I turn my head, I can see my shadow thrown against the wall by a fallen light, still flickering in defiance of the dark. A wiry, gangly shadow monster grips my shadow’s head, and I can feel another greasy, slimy memory try to worm its way into my head. I summon my sword, head pounding as I slash at the shadow. My blade carves through a wall of lockers, and the shadow remains.

  The malicious, greasy fantasy slides into my mind, and as it starts to take over, I partition myself. Time to multi-task.

  I look down a street in Seoul. Hundreds lie dead but— I stumble to my feet. It stays attached to my shadow, and more tendrils lance into— I try to look for survivors, but the radio screams again. I take off running, but I can hear those on the other ends choking on blood as they scream— my shadow. My head pounds again. I drop my sword and reach back with a fist. I plunge it into the pile of rubble— I finally arrive, again, just moments too late. I watch Jang die from another angle. A tidal wave of ants the size of tanks rumble down the street.— The shadow creature just flows around my fist, uncaring— Not again! With a scream of rage I launch myself at the avalanche of concrete insects, fist pulled back— My fist rockets towards the shadow monster, and fire bubbles from deep inside— Blue fire pours from my fist, my faceplate, my very being. It slams into the lead ant, and the world takes a breath—

  Fire races down from my arm as I tear through bent steel and shattered concrete. The shadow monster screams in silent agony as blue actinide lightning and fire rips across it. It twitches and writhes as it dies, vanishing in an instant.

  The reward orb and the exit form nearby, and I fall to a knee in exhaustion. I want to rest, for just a moment. I wish I had the time. I collect the crystals before unsteadily making my way out.

  As soon as I exit, the Fracture disappears with a hum, and I call the officer in charge of the defense.

  “Did… did anyone get inside? Before I got here?”

  “No, all the students and staff have been accounted for.”

  I sit down heavily and lie on the ground in relief.