Give 'em Hell; short stories

Burnt Russian Corpse

Title: Burnt Russian Corpse
Purpose: Goretober writing prompt

Genre: Thriller
Warnings: Mutilation

Description: Avana is trying to keep the Walking Mansion under control but things keep getting out of hand.

Note: This has no conclusion, as there was a word limit to the prompt.

Dr. Crane's walking mansion was moving swiftly across the cold open terrain of eastern Russia. It took a brief break at Elgygytgyn Lake for a night, which was perfect for Avana to tend to the animals before the wild adventure continued. Never in all her years living in the mansion had it managed to leave the Americas. And even at that, it had hardly left South America for years. On occasion, she'd find the mansion would take them to Mexico. Then, very suddenly, she'd found herself in Montana a few weeks ago, meeting Azon Conners and his disfigured corpse-like body, ill and on the brink of death. And a week after that, she was in Alaska, meeting William Woods and tending to the injuries he'd received to his jaw. Alaska was beautiful.

Russia was something else. How the mansion had managed to cross the water break between the furthest tip of Alaska and the outstretched hand of eastern Russia was unknown to her. It wasn't a large gap, per se, but it was still baffling to her. Russia as a whole was unknown to her. Really, most of the world was. The world she used to know was entirely restricted to Illinois, and her world after that was the Spanish-Portuguese cultures of South America. Those countries were warm and colorful. Russia was cold and unwelcoming.

Dr. Crane's walking mansion didn't stay near the lake for long. It seemed the second Avana turned in for bed she was awakened by the jostling movements of the mansion running over a mountainous terrain. It liked to keep separate from big cites. Although the mansion spent a lot of time in Argentina, Avana had never seen Buenos Aires. If the mansion would have stayed in America for the rest of her life, she'd never see Los Angelos, New York City, Chicago, or even a smaller city such as Portland. She'd be bound to the west, where there was nothing but flatlands of vacant mountains for miles. Russia was no different.

After a day had past, the mansion came upon a winding spectacle of a river. Checking the date, Avana discovered that it was October 3rd, the fourth day of the black sky. She thought the black sky was due to being in the northern hemisphere. But at this time of year, the sun should not remain dark for so long. At least, not for a few months.

The river was incredibly large and ran for miles with no identifiable source. The mansion ran alongside the river for a while. Although it was October, the world outside the shutters appeared green and vibrant. However, this was in despite of the disappearance of the sun.

When the mansion parked itself, Avana tried to get some bearings on where they were. It certainly was nowhere found on any map. Russia was especially difficult when it came to identifying where one was. Dr. Crane himself was busy tending to William who, in the best way possibly put, was having "another feral fit." William had the tendency to bite Dr. Crane and Avana, but never Azon. It was rather peculiar. His biting did hurt quite a bit. After all, Dr. Crane had modified his entire skull to function like a snake's so that he could unhinge his jaw and split it open in two different directions. William was horrifying.

But all of this was normal to Avana. What wasn't normal was the mansion's sudden erratic behavior to take them to Russia and not have the gall to tell them where they were.

Avana decided to stop pestering the mansion for answers, and gave up on taking these matters into her own hands. She went about doing her usual chores: oiling up her joints (she was dominantly a cyborg after all), tending to the disfigured and altered animals of Dr. Crane, cleaning out the sties, washing up the grime the mansion had picked up from the journey here, taking all preparations for Dr. Crane's day as usual, throwing out the spoiled food in the kitchen, and lastly, checking up on Azon.