Poison Paradise - Damned of the 2/19th

Ghost Town & Fisticuffs

"This is... weird," Charlie said, stepping out onto the broken and cracked road. Weeds and jungle plants had pushed up between the cracks, making lines of vegetation that turned the road into an odd patchwork. Most of the plants were only waist high, and to Charlie and Sarah it looked like the plants hadn't made too many inroad further into the small town.

The two young women moved up to the first car, which sat mournful and abandoned. There were mannequins in the seats, still belted in, that were blackened and headless. Rotting clothing was visible from roughly the waist down. Neither one noted that the mannequin's backs were unburnt. The paint had peeled, leaving just patches of sky blue that were badly sun faded, with the front of the car bleached almost white. Both of them stared at it as they walked by, heading toward the store.

"What's with the mannequins?" Charlie asked, staring at several that were laying in the street, limbless.

"I have no idea," Sarah said softly. "It's... creepy."

Both of them moved up to the building marked "Jeb's General Store", looking in the shattered window. Most of the shelves were tipped over, the windows were shattered, and in places the roof had holes in it.

"Look, cans," Charlie said. She stepped over the edge of the window, being careful to avoid stepping on one of the mannequins. Sarah moved over and went through the door. She hustled over to where some of the cans had been shielded from the weather by the way the shelves had fallen.

Sarah squatted down and picked up one of the cans, then frowned at it. It felt too light in her hand.

Charlie shook one of the cans that the fading paper read "GOLDEN PEACHES" on it. "I think this is empty."

"So's this," Sarah said. She started grabbing other cans, shaking them, and dropping them. "They're all empty."

"What the hell is this?" Charlie asked, slowly turning around. "Look, what is that?"

Sarah turned to look and saw a tracked military vehicle, painted in camoflauge, sitting in the street out the back door of the store.

"The military?" She asked. She headed out the back door, Charlie dodging the fallen shelves to join her. "What are the military doing here?"

The vehicle wasn't like any of them that either women had seen in movies. Low slung, tracked, with a nasty looking turret. They walked around it, staring at it. The side of the vehicle opposite of the way they'd come into town looked bleached, much more faded than the rest of it. On the far side a semi-circle of sandbags were set out, five sandbags high, with rusted barbed wire on top. Mannequins were stacked, sitting up, against the sandbags.

"Some of them have old bandages on them," Sarah said, kneeling down. She tugged at the cloth and it tore with a nearly silent purring sound. A wad of rotted cloth fell from underneath the cloth, unfolding slightly.

"These two have splints on their legs," Charlie said. She looked around. "This is really, really bizarre."

Sarah pointed at one of the houses. A square single story house with a garage, a rusted and faded car sitting in the driveway. The grass of the lawn was waist high, jungle plants scattered through it. "Let's look in there."

The two women walked up the driveway, glancing into the car. Again, the windows were all shattered.

"Hang on," Charlie said.

Sarah watched the other woman move to the front of the car, reaching under the lip of the hood, and feel around for a second.

"Found it," She said. She made a face and there was a clack before the hood popped up. Charlie lifted it up and looked inside. "Huh, the engine is here. How weird," She slammed the hood down and rust mixed with paint flakes puffed up, sending both girls to coughing. They moved away from the ruined car, waving their hands in front of their faces, and to the front door of the house. They stopped and stared at the door once they were able to get a good look at what had looked like odd shadows.