Poison Paradise - Damned of the 2/19th

Broken and Working Brains

"You trained there, back in the early 80's, right?" The man with stars on his collar asked me.

I nodded, hands behind my back. where am i? and stared out the window behind him.

"Oh, sit down, sergeant, you aren't in trouble this time," the man laughed. his laughter floated around the room, iridescentbubblesfloatingaroundthesparkingair. "it's not an important mew mew mew mew mew mew mew mew."

I nodded and my head wslipwedw off,l anding on the carpeting like sea fronds waving

impact impeact pact impact

system offline
revert to drownproofingtraing
curl. fumblefumblelaces. break surface
treadtreadtread.
lacestogetheraroundneck
beltbucklefingersclumsy
SYSTEM ERROR
pantsoff. swingthroughair. inflatelegs
layincrotch.
SYSTEM CHECK
leftlegat70%
blurredvisiondoublevision
scanningscanningscanning
land.movingmovingmoving
NEURAL SPIKE DETECTED!
ant.exe has crashed
ant.exe is not responding
PERSONALITY OVERLAY OFFLINE
PERSONALITY OVERLAY IN TRAUMA MODE
survive.exe is running
dcc.bat is running
1.243x10e5 programs damaged
dcc.bat priority system 17% sorted
WARNING NEURAL SPIKE DETECTED
i promise
lizard.bat is running
000A in progress
000B 14% complete
000C complete. 72 hours stock
000D in progress, 14% complete
000E SERE OVERRIDE
000F in progress 8%
00AA OFFLINE: more data needed
000Ex6 SERE OVERRIDE
00BAx1 SERE OVERRIDE
00AA4x6 SERE OVERRIDE
survive
survive

Richard, Mike, and Renee walked into the clearing, voices from the rest of the group having been audible in tone and volume if not words, by the time they were fifty paces away.

As they guessed, the argument was about the shelters.

"...get one for yourself. You want one, build one," Charlie was yelling at Tommy.

"Fuck you. If you wanted one, you shouldn't have gone running off to play around in the jungle," Tommy sneered. "First come, first serve," he folded his arms over his chest and glared at the other woman.

"Look, you jumped up little punk," Charlie said, stepping forward, balling her fists. Sarah was standing next to her and reached toward her, then dropped her hand at Tommy's next words.

"Shut up, cunt," Tommy said.

"What did I tell you about respect," Richard growled, stepping forward.

Tommy jumped, whirling around. "Don't fucking touch me!"

Richard stomped into the middle of the encampment. "I won't as long as you stop acting like a little asshole," He mock-lunged toward Tommy, who fell backwards and scrambled back on his hands. "I don't want to beat your ass every fucking day we're stuck here, but I will if that's what it takes to make you control your nasty mouth."

"Please, stop," Lori cried out, hugging the baby close. The baby struggled, trying to go back to watching what was happening.

Richard stepped back, deliberately turning away from Tommy.

"Stop what?" Don asked, walking into camp with Kevin and Raincloud. He hopped across the rocks in the creek, stopping at the bank. When he saw Renee looking at him with squinted eyes and pursed lips he frowned. "What?"

"You don't think it's a little interesting that those rocks are there?" She asked. She stepped forward, staring at them. "Look at them."

Everyone turned to look, Lori glad for the break in tension. She didn't want to see more violence, didn't want the baby exposed to violence.

Renee pointed at the rocks. "They're a half step apart, all the way across the creek. Nicely shaped, flat tops. Placed in a straight line," he pointed upstream, then downstream. "Notice that there aren't any other rocks sitting like this."