The End

Malakists

"So you're a mutant?!" asked Myles disbelievingly as we caught our breath. We had ran from Salvation's gates for at least 10 minutes before stopping, which was when Myles asked his question. "Yeah I guess" I managed to gasp "I kinda forgot and I've never been able to stop anything like a bullet before!".

"You forgot!?" asked Myles incredulously "you're gifted with an amazing mutation and you forgot about it!!??" "Calm down man" I said "I've had a lot happen to me in the past few days and I was too busy thinking about them to mess around with telekinesis". We stood there panting for breath steadying ourselves, and Myles said "well from what I heard you super mutants usually have more than one ability, so what else are you holding out on me?" "Look Myles" I said a little exasperatedly "if I do have anything else, I don't know. I haven't tried everything and I don't know what to try to see anyway, so if I do get anything else you'll be the first to know!".

Myles sighed "okay then, let's go Jason" and he led me down the road, gun held loosely in his arms. "How far is it?" I asked. "Quite far" he replied grimly "so let's try not get killed". We walked on in silence for a while, boots crunching on the cracked asphalt of the road. "Really went to hell didn't it" I said suddenly. "It did..." said Myles, a sense of loss in his calm voice.

We both carried on walking now in contemplation, as I surveyed the street we were walking down. It was lined with detached houses of varying colour all covered with layers of moss, algea and dust, it all looked dead, empty and abandoned. The many trees that lined the street were now dead, blackened and twisted, the bushes still seemed to be alive but had turned purple or black. It all felt unnatural, dead and hopelessly mournful.

"Stop!" said Myles quietly but suddenly, raising a closed fist in a military gesture. I froze and crouched down as Myles gestured in another military signal to get down. "What is it?" I breathed. "Something is moving in that larger house up ahead" Myles whispered back. Sure enough as I looked carefully at the indicated building a slight shadow at the window was visible and it was bobbing up and down as if breathing.

"I see it" I whispered, scared of alerting that ominous shadow to our presence, "what is it?" I asked "I would hazard a guess that it's a malakist" came the reply. The name sent a shudder down my spine, "whats that?" I queried apprehensive at what might be said. "Mutated animal" answered Myles "driven mad with pain and radiation".

I looked at the bobbing shadow wondering what it hid. "You do not want to see it" muttered Myles seemingly seeing where I was looking at and knowing what I was thinking "It will hunt you down, stalk you and rip you apart alive". As we turned back to the house we froze and then pulled back our gun handles. The shadow had gone.

"Where the fu..." Myles started but he never finished his sentence, as a loud blood curdling howl sounded from the bushes up ahead. We both raised our rifles instinctively aimed straight at the source of the noise. "Don't run" said Myles no longer trying to be discreet "if you run, malakists will immediately attack you, but if you stand your ground they will be more cautious". I had barely nodded when the bush we were aiming at shuddered and a long grey snout slowly emerged proceeding a heavy long starved looking body with flat wide paws displaying black curved claws.

The malakist looked at us with large eyes, which were a solid flat black. It was covered in cuts and slashes and it's shoulder seemed to have been shot at some point and now looked green, sickly and infected. A low rumbling growl emanated from it's throat conveying only one feeling: hunger.

"Alright then" Myles said standing up suddenly "lets dance!" and without hesitation let fly a spray of bullets from his AK. The malakist didn't even have time to make a sound before it collapsed into a limp pile on the ground.

I scrambled to my feet raising my gun as the echo of Myles's AK died and this time multiple howls sounded around us from the bushes and without even a warning no less than 6 malakists swarmed out of the foliage at us.

The malakists immediately surrounded us running in a circle, barking, snarling and growling, looking for a weakness or gap in our defences. Me and Myles now stood back to back guns raised daring the malakists to come nearer, and finally one did. The largest malakist in the pack lunged at me claws first jaws snapping, and I pulled the trigger releasing a salvo of rounds right into it's face. I side-stepped the falling body and looked back at the rest of the pack, who were still circling us, and we were intending to kill every last one of the malakists.

I grinned, anticipating the sight of the collapsing bodies, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. "FUCK!!" I yelled looking down at the gun to see it jammed. The malakists, sensing my defencelessness, pounced. I managed to get to my pistol just in time as the first malakist reached me, it's face less than a meter away, and drilled a bullet straight through it's forehead.

Myles's AK was chattering away at the other half of the group as the malakists relentlessly attacked us. I sidestepped a second malakist, blowing the side of it's face clean off, the third malakist managed to pounce onto me knocking me to the ground.

Before it could do anything else though I had unsheathed my knife and plunged it into the side of it's mouth.

The malakist now howled and whined trying to get away but I held on with all my might twisting the blade of my knife in the side of the malakists mouth, and finally with a horrible stomach-churning ripping sucking noise I tore the malakists lower jaw off.

The screeching was incredible and as I released the malakist it simply rolled thrashing and twitching on the ground screeching. Myles had dealt with the rest of the pack just as I had ripped the malakists jaw off, and now walked to the thrashing creature and shot it once in the head.

Immediately it went limp and the shot echoed for a long time in silence that spanned between us. "C'mon" said Myles breaking the silence at last "lets get going, all that noise would've attracted the attention of everything in the area" and I muttered "yeah.. Okay....." as I straightened up slowly and followed Myles down the road.