New World Rangers

Prologue: Second Chance

            There was a man, a lonely man, walking down a desolate street. The man was a product of the old world, used over-abundance and over-indulgence. The old world was gone now; it died a slow, rancorous death. He did not mourn its passing. Now, in the murderous hell-scape that was the new world, after all that he has been through trying to shape it, all he sought to do is a little good.

            The man walked down the street, passing the abandoned suburban houses, with shingles and siding falling off, broken windows, and lawns decades overgrown. Judging by the man’s experience, those houses would not have much of use in them, the old world feeling of security left those houses relatively unprotected, so they were the first to be ransacked. Besides, ferals liked to take naps in them, not worth the risk, so he moved on, until he came upon a school.  

            It was a large school, high school according to the remnants of a sign in front of it, with two three story buildings on either side, with a long one story building connected them. The man surveyed the area. No public service vehicles such as police cars or fire trucks, and no sign of any kind of aid station, the parking lot was empty. It was odd that a school, a central location that everybody in the community would know how to get to, remained un-utilized as an aid station when the old world fell, but it was good for the man. An abandoned aid station would have either been cleared out by marauders and scavengers, the high school along with, or it would have been overrun by ferals.

            The man approached the school. The doors were locked, so he went to the west most building, where he quietly managed to open a window. Before he set foot inside, he pulled out his m1911 handgun, equipped with a silencer, and the tomahawk he acquired in a past life, better safe than sorry after all.

            He found himself in a derelict chemistry room, the only light coming from the windows. The room was lacking of all chemicals and flask, likely the result of Vultures, a special sect of scavengers. That’s no problem for him, Vultures seemed to only take useless old world junk, and never food. The hallways were even darker, with meager light spilling through windowed doors of the classrooms.

            He made his way to the west side of the building, not even bothering to check the rooms he passed, he knew what he was looking, and he would know it when he saw it.

            He descended a staircase, putting him on the ground floor eastern building, which was where he found the cafeteria. The kitchen was a bit dusty, but otherwise untouched. He ignored the freezer, nothing in it would be edible after this long; besides, the man hated the smell of spoiled dairy, and he’d crawl a city street full of ferals before he’d confront the smell of spoiled milk. No, the man was smart, he went straight to dry storage, where he found a cornucopia of all the canned goods a wanderer like him could want. He laughed (it had been awhile since the man has eaten something that he hadn’t killed), as he stuffed cans of beans and sloppy Joe into his pack. He remembered hating this shit as a kid, now he couldn’t be happier to get it.

            He is not a greedy man, so he took only what he need, and then decided to do his good deed for the day. He found the art room on the east side of the central building. Before getting to work, he took a minute to study the decaying paintings. They weren’t that good, not that the man is an expert in art (he always thought painting was stupid), but he enjoyed them none the less, it reminded him more peaceful times, when people could afford to partake in such frivolous activities. He placed his pack on a table close to the door, and holstered his weapons. Grabbing a paint brush, he went to work. He had shit hand writing, but he thought it was legible enough. It said “Food Here” and had a rough map to the cafeteria. No marauder would believe the sign, they would think it was a trap set up by some rival gang, only the desperate dare brave this labyrinth, and that was exactly who the man wanted to have the food.