The ship landed safely back at the town, immediately unloading the cargo of the famous drug right by the warehouses owned by Matilda.

‘There! A total of twelve boxes of Izpering.’ Matilda then snapped her fingers, her mercs bringing out the fuel barrels and rolling them onto the ship.

‘This should last you months at least. Now I take it you wanna leave our lovely little town?’

‘As quick as possible.’

‘Why so eager? Did you encounter the leviathan?’

‘It was a miracle we survived. That thing is the single largest mutant I have ever seen.’

‘Ya terrible thing that...I just don’t know what to do about it. Ah well at least the boys will be happy now.’

They separated, preparing to leave when a young female ran up to them.

‘Wait! Don’t leave I got a job!’

Jack stopped just as she was about to press the button.

‘What kind of job?’

‘I need you to help us with the Leviathan.’

‘Can’t do that. It would have to take underwater MK3 torpedoes just to wound that thing.’

‘I never said to kill it! Although as great as that would be we need any kind of help! Even if its just helping our boats get past it.’

‘You don’t wanna stay here do you?’

‘Our town is dying, our food stock is shrinking by the day and the forest doesn’t provide nearly enough. Without our fishing then we’re doomed! So either we kill it or move somewhere else, and the later seems much more plausible.’

Jack thought about it some. She suspected that the Dreaded lady could distract that thing, giving others the chance to sail away out of its territory. But that was still a huge risk on their part..

‘Whats your offer?’

‘Anything! Anything I can give its yours!’

‘I’ll match it!’ the old man from the bar stepped up next to the young lady.

‘I got some old treasures from my younger days stored away. Its yours if take the job.’

Jack sighted, she really hated refusing a job but she seriously doubted whatever they had was worth the risk of dealing with that thing again.

‘Let me discuss it with my crew.’

Jack gathered everyone and told them about the job.

‘You can’t be fucking serious!! I stared that thing in the eyes! I was meters, fucking METERS, away from being eaten alive!!’ Kel immediately yelled out.

‘Ya I’m with short temper here, no payment is worth this job.’

The old sailor named Graham took out a map and a keycard from his coat pocket.

‘This here is something that has been passed down to me from many generations. There’s a legend in my family that this map will lead to a great treasure and the card is the key to open it.’

He handed the map to Jack who inspected it closely.

‘There’s an area marked here. Lab 12...what do you think?’

‘I think there’s something of worth there. The old world was decades ahead in technology compared to us, most of the empire is built on stuff left behind by them.’

‘I should probably say something as well.’ Caleb stepped forward, holding up the box.

‘That thing again? Hows it connected to any of this?’

‘Earlier today it began to glow much brighter than usual, and got louder. In fact the inner machinations worked itself enough for the cube to get almost to hot to touch.’

‘Ya so?’

‘So it happened right when the Leviathan passed under the ship.’

He turned to Jack, presenting it clearly. ‘Javelin wanted this thing badly, and the Leviathan is connected to it. This place holds the answers, you know this information is far to valuable to just pass up.’

‘Well why don’t we just dive back in and ask the fucking thing??’

This did change thing tough... given the new information the crew had stumbled upon something huge. Like something equally secret to the Empresses real name.

‘Alright....we’ll investigate this.’

‘WHAT??’

‘No one is making you dive back in Kel! I doubt we would get anything out of that anyway. We’ll stay a short while and see if we can find anything.’

‘Well fucking fantastic!’

‘Thank you! Thank you so much!’

The townsfolk left the ship and the crew discussed their first move.

‘So where do we begin?’

‘Would could just fly above water for a little while until that cube starts glowing again, see if we can activate it or something if it gets like that.’

‘Bad idea!! I say ask around for any old world places nearby. Like a lab, a base or anything.’ Doc suggested.

‘The only place I can think of is that abandoned asylum up on the hill. But I doubt there’s anything related to either the box or sea monsters there.’ Juan commented.

‘Interesting ideas. I can check the map for any nearby places of note. Kel? You got any?’

‘I still vote for leaving this hellhole!’

‘Rock?’

‘Me do what captain says.’ that answer was not surprising at all, Rock wasn’t someone for making decisions. He was more happy to do as told.

‘Caleb? You’re the tech wizard here so what do you suggest?’

‘If that thing is related to the cube, despite its own lab being miles south from here, then I bet there’s another lab somewhere nearby connecting the Leviathan and the cube. I guess it would be underwater or at least right by the ocean somewhere but without knowing its exact locations its far to risky to just search the entire ocean floor.’

Just as he said that the cube started gently glowing on and off again before going completely dark.

‘Right I guess that was it again.. Right Kel you can stay with me. Juan, Caleb you two search the town. Doc you dig up some of old biology books of yours. See if you can at least find a hint as to what kind of mutant we’re dealing with. And Rock...you do your thing.’

Everyone split up and got to work, an uneasy feeling growing in the pit of their stomachs. There was something wrong about this place but no one could quite place it.

Juan and Caleb went to the local pub, seeing at least a few dozen in there enjoying their ever dwindling beer.

Juan spotted the young lady who got them the job first and decided to talk to her while Caleb turned to the old sea captain.

‘You lost son?’ he asked as Caleb sat down.

‘I need you to tell me everything you know about that thing.’

‘Well I know as much as everyone else. It showed up out of nowhere, about ten years ago, or was it eleven?...bah doesn’t matter it showed that’s the point! It started slow first, just some creepy noises that scared sailors. Then the fish got fewer, like a second town was secretly fishing in our waters. Then it got closer, the noises grew louder and people began to swear that there was something out there.

And then...the first attack came, several weeks into it. We didn’t think to much of it at first, loosing fishermen did happen unfortunately. But then another one, and another. We kept sending out boats only for fewer to return. And then it was old granny Crockett, the Emps rescue ships found her. Those soldiers tried to kill it but never got close, their ranks got butchered in some kind of battle. The very few who remained packet up and left, deeming this town a sudden waste of resources. And we have been alone ever since, just watching as our food supply shrunk with each year, the forest and our only farm not producing enough.’

‘Have you ever seen it?’

‘No, after Crockett I swore off sailing till that thing is dead. I don’t want the last thing I see to be that monster bearing down on me.’

‘Anything else you can tell me? Anything at all?’

‘Well the Emps left behind a submarine but no one here knows how to operate it. Not to mention its unarmed, the Emps took the ammo so even if we did know how to drive it, its useless now. Besides that there’s the old world asylum up the hill but the town stripped it clean of anything useful long before I was born! These days the youngsters mostly go there to scare themselves, a test of courage or something like that I guess.’

‘Any old world labs tough?’

‘Those science places? Not that I know of.’

‘And that’s for the best..’ they turned to see a old man dressed in a robe and a chain tied around his neck.

‘Science is evil! Science is the root of all sin! Only when we discard ALL technology will that divine being leave us alone. Its here to carry out the punishment for our crimes against the all maker!’

‘Oh shove off you crazy zealot!’

‘Who’s this?’ Caleb asked.

‘Roberto, our so called “priest” but all he’s doing is using this situation to scare everyone into following his bullcrap religion.’

‘Its the holy truth you unholy heathen! I have seen the light and therefore the creature will not harm me!’

‘It never harmed you cause you never went out to the ocean in the first place!’

‘I will not get on one of those unholy machines! Man was meant for the land! Not the sea...or air for that matter.’ he glared at Caleb as he said that last part.

He wasn’t intimated tough, he had seen his share of zealots in the Capital, obsessed with the blessings of the Empress. Barely anyone believed she was divine tough..

‘Whatever, go worship a tree or something you maniac. Real men are talking here.’

‘You will suffer the cold grip of the Darkworld for what you’re doing mark my words!’ Roberto stormed out, almost slipping on his robe.

‘You can never be rid of zealots anywhere it seems.’ Caleb said.

‘Unfortunately not my boy, but pay him no heed. He’s annoying but ultimately harmless.’

Caleb looked over to see Juan chatting up the woman from before. She seemed entranced, smiling and swiping her hair aside like one typically did when showing attraction.

‘Is there anything else you can tell me?’

‘Not about the Leviathan.’ then their conversation was interrupted by a alarm bell ringing loudly.

‘Ah hell here we go again!’

The old man stood up and took out his gun.

‘Follow me lad! There’s a fight coming our way!’

Caleb followed him to the edges of town where everyone gathered, armed and ready. Not all carried guns, there were plenty of wooden spears, harpoons and machetes. Then he saw the threat ahead, out of the forest slow moving human shaped creatures appeared, their skin was scaly and transparent, eyes bloated orbs and mouths large and wide, showing tiny teeth. The guns started to fire, spears and axes thrown.

Caleb joined in, getting head shot after head shot. It was easy to aim on slow targets such as these. Green, blue ish blood spurted out out of their heads as they collapsed on the ground, they let out a deep hissing like noise as their webbed hands reached out.

As more and more emerged from the woods Caleb wondered if they really had enough ammo for this but then louder shots were heard. Kel, Jack, Rock and Doc all came down from the hill. Kel’s favorite shotgun blasted huge holes and severed limps from them. Jack threw a grenade right into the middle of the huge band, taking out a large portion of them. Rock swung a giant club, much larger than a sledgehammer. The sheer strength of his swing severed body parts from them, sending blood and gore flying in the air.

Doc, wearing a gas tank on his back, unleashed a torrent of flames from his robotic arm. A hissing scream was sounded as the mutants burned alive. Soon the battle ended, corpses littered the outline of town.

‘Well this went better than the usual wave. Thanks strangers!’ The townsfolk seemed to greatly appreciate the aid, although creeped out by the odd looking fellows.

‘What are these things?’

‘No idea but they keep showing up at random. For ten years they come out of the forest in ever larger waves. Its most likely only a matter of time before they overwhelm us.’

Caleb finally started taking pity on these folks. Already they were dying thanks to a giant sea monster destroying their fishing boats and now they had to fend off mutant waves at the same time?

‘Did you try to locate the source?’ Jack asked one.

‘Many times missy, many times! But the ones going out to look for it rarely ever comes back.’

‘Why didn’t Matilda launch an assault then? She has the numbers and the guns to easily handle hordes such at these.’

‘She doesn’t care! She never did! Everyone single one of her family was nothing but selfish and cruel, leaving us to do all the work while they sat in their precious mansion, sucking up drugs and booze!’

Then Juan turned back to Sera. ‘If you had this problem then why didn’t you hire us to deal with the land mutants?’

‘Cause I had to prioritize survival! If you deal with them then we’re still stuck between miles of wilderness and a sea monster! If you deal the leviathan then at least we can escape on our ships and resettle elsewhere!’

‘You’re still on that??’ Graham seemed agitated.

‘Its the only way to survive!’

‘You’d rather abandon our home!’

‘This town is DOOMED! Can’t you see it!??’

‘HMPFH!’ Graham stormed off and the crowd scattered, everyone returning to their daily lives.

*

‘Sea monster, land monsters, mafia. This town is just a magnet for bad shit.’

‘True. But this changes things. And Matilda doesn’t seem interested in changing things despite having by far the most power.’ Jack pointed out.

‘So we ditch this place and leave right?’

‘No.’

‘No??’

‘No. There’s still Caleb’s cube. And if Javelin wants it, if it reacts to a giant monster in the sea, then surely you can admit that thing is part of something bigger. A chance of a payout for life.’

‘I hardly thing that the fucking thing can get us money.’

‘I didn’t mean that kind of payout. It could lead us to a massive old world secret, like a super weapon. Like something that could deal massive damage to the Emps..’

‘Shit cap, did they fuck you over or something?’

‘You could say that.’

‘Oh ya...why did you leave them anyway?’

‘...long story. But lets just say that there’s a certain someone still in their ranks that I want dead. And this certain someone will never stop hunting me until I am dead as well.’

‘Oh...well what do we from here then?’

‘Well first we can’t investigate something with those fucking land creatures running amok, they’ll slow us down. We find out were they’re coming from, deal with that annoyance and get back on track.’

‘Walking trough the woods seems like a bad idea.’

‘Yet we can’t fly cause there’s barely any landing space out here. Although we do have someone especially suited for this kind of work.’

*

Rock walked trough the dark forest as nightfall settled in. He wore his improvised armor, iron plating on his arms, legs, torso with a helmet. To the helmet a light was attached, on his back was his hammer attached to the side of the ammo bag for his machine gun that he was itching to use again. Rock was seeing as an idiot to most, only useful for his muscles as all ogres. And why not, their lack of language skills always made a poor impression but that wasn’t the case. Ogres were survivalists. Were the rest of the crew would die, Rock would survive the wild easily. His stomach capable of processing things that would kill humans, his wounds healing extremely quickly and his body hard as rock. He followed the many traces he saw, the footprints, the drops of dried up slime that he saw pouring out of the mutants mouths.

He easily spotted things like this for that is were his brainpower went, ogres weren’t the social creatures. Something that, for the few humans who knew this, almost seemed a little to convenient..

For hours he trekked on trough the forest, the sounds of other wildlife not disturbing him the slightest.

He wandered on for hours, some wildlife coming across him but to afraid to bother giant wandering trough their territory.

After hours of wandering he finally found something. Deep within the forest was some kind of old world facility. Large, partly rusted metal walls rising above the trees.

Next to that was some kind of large tanks, filled with some kind of green light coming out of the top. Rock walked up the stairs along the wall of the first tank and the main building. The inside had a strange green liquid, glowing bright green. Rock took out the Geiger counter on his belt and to his surprise it wasn’t radioactive.

He kept going forward, eventually finding a way inside. A door in the side of the main building leading to a downward staircase. Once emerging below the tanks he saw a pretty big facility, glass tanks along the walls filled with the liquid. Inside those were women, or at least it looked like women. Their skin was mutated tough, it was hard to make out trough all the green but it looked purple, red ish. Their faces concealed behind breathing masks connected to tubes, smaller tubes going into their stomachs with something being pumped into them.

Their genitals were also attached to long tubes, going into the floor somewhere. Rock felt disgusted when he saw something emerging from the woman into the tube and was sucked downwards. He continued down the hall, passing quietly by these poor souls, assuming they were alive at all. He reached the next room and stood these massive glass tubes filled with the green liquid. There were thing swimming inside them, small fleshy creatures in different sizes. Rock had no idea what was going but he knew the others would definitively want to see this.

He left the same way he came, curious as to kind of old world nightmare they had made this time.

When he got out someone stood there by the edge of the forest. A human dressed in brown, ragged robes and a chainsaw in hand.

‘You trespass on holy ground beast.’ he started it up and charged him. Rock slammed the barrel of his minigun into the side of the attacker. He fell over to the side, dropping the saw before being finished off with a stomp that broke his ribcage and neck. Rock shrugged it off, charging a ogre with a chainsaw? Only a true idiot would do that, but a..what did the captain call it again? A cult! There was a cult involved in this somehow. He walked back in a faster pace, intent on reporting everything he found to Jack.

*

The glasses clinked, the red wine gently reflecting the light of the candles.

‘This looks expensive, where did you get it?’

‘I think its from a high class brewer somewhere, I can’t remember.’ Juan answered Sera.

‘I had forgotten what it actually tastes like.’

After the attack Juan kept charming the young woman, immediately feeling attracted.

In terms of the mutants she was as clueless as everyone else.

‘Look Juan I appreciate everything you do really but I have to wonder. Why? Its obviously we barely have anything to offer for a job that scale, even Matilda would struggle if she actually cared. And then you agree cause if that strange box your friend was carrying. Whats the deal?’

‘I’m not sure myself honestly. But our engineer seems to think its important and that’s good enough for me.’

‘Well who am I to question your loyalty?’

‘Especially seems you’re aiming to leave you mean?’

‘I must seem pretty awful huh?’

‘Not really. I actually understand your situation for you see, I grew up in this small town far south of here, in the wasteland deserts. It was built on top of a old nuclear waste disposal ground and over the years deep cracks had started to form, radiation leaked out and it became increasingly dangerous to live there.’

‘Sounds terrible.’

‘It was, and all of us kids knew it and said we needed to move. Yet the old timers refused, kept saying that it was our home and we need to stay no matter what, even if it meant making sacrifices. Back then I thought they meant us, the people, so I got so angry with my parents that day that I eventually packed up and left. Never saw them again after that.’

‘That’s...tragic. Did you ever hear what happened to them?’

‘Ya, about two years later I met one of my old friends who told me they had a plan to fix the cracks, and the sacrifices they were talking about was risking fewer lives to steal some old cement bags from a Empire depot that was mostly abandoned. I felt so terrible for leaving everyone behind I was on the urge to rush back only to hear that I made the right call after all. Cause the Emps found out and attacked. The town was stripped and he had no idea how many survived.’

‘Shit.. I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘I’m pretty sure the Emps will be sorry one day. When you have as many enemies such as they do its on borrowed time.’

They took another sip of red wine.

‘So you are well traveled Juan. Have you ever encountered anything like the Leviathan before?’

‘Nope. I have seen Gargans but not even they are that big.’

Juan looked over to see a picture hanging on the wall. Something about it caught his interest, it looked like a dark spire rising from the ocean but he was looking at from far away.

‘Cool picture huh?’ Sera asked him as she walked over and took it off, holding it up closer to him. It was a black a white picture of a lighthouse, standing on a small, lone island in the ocean.

‘My dad took this when I was a kid. He said he stumbled across this during one of his fishing trips and wanted to explore it, he never got the chance tough cause....the leviathan, you know..’

‘I’m sorry about that.’

‘Its alright..it was years ago and as they say...life goes on..’ she said with a saddened expression on her face, hanging it back on the wall.

‘Juan I need everyone back on the ship.’ Jacks voice said trough his radio.

‘Sorry Sera, duty calls.’ he gently patted her shoulder as he walked out, heading back to the ship where Rock briefed everyone.

‘So these things comes from a lab? And a cult is guarding it?’ Jack summarized.

‘I actually met one like that! In the bar there was this really religious nutcase who babbled on about gods wrath and whatnot and he wore that getup.’ Caleb added in.

‘Somethings going on clearly. Juan I want you track down this cult, find out anything you can. Rock, Caleb we three head to the lab and scan it for any info we can. Kel, Doc you two guard the ship. I don’t trust these villagers, especially with both a mafia and a cult in the same place and want two of us guarding the lady at all times.’  

They armed themselves and headed out, Jack bringing an entire assault rifle this time along with her usual pistol.

Caleb brought his equipment, knowing what kind of gear would be at a lab.

Juan headed to town, intent on asking the people about the cult nearby.

He went back to Sera’s place, the girl had been the most friendly thus far, not to mention attractive, so he assumed she would be the most likely to tell him.

She seemed slightly surprised to see him so soon after he left but let him in none the less.

‘So Sera about this cult..’

‘Oh no you mean Roberto and his gang? They’re annoying but mostly harmless. If we stay out of their so called “sacred grove” they will do nothing else but bother us about our “sinful” ways.’

‘Where is this grove by the way?’

‘You don’t actually mean to go there right?’

‘Of course not! But I don’t wanna stubble into it by accident.’

‘Makes sense. Its a little south west of town, into the forest. You can see it by their campfires, by a large tree. They will straight up attack any non members when they enter.’

‘I see...thanks. I’ll have to warn the others.’ Juan took out his radio and told everyone, Sera merely watching. After the radio was put back in his pocket she took a deep breath and asked the question.

‘I hate to be burden but....after this. Do you think you can give me transport away from here?’

‘Come again?’

‘There’s a big chance you’ll never kill the leviathan anyway, and flying is the only way to escape. So how about I change my job for you if it doesn’t work out? You take away and drop me off at a different settlement?’

‘I dunno Sera, Jack is usually hesitant to transport strangers. In fact she doesn’t take in anyone unless there’s no other choice.’

‘I can convince her, like I am trying to convince you now..’

‘Sera..’

‘Look the town is dead, my entire family is dead, my friends are either dead or stopped talking to me. There’s nothing left for me here, not a damn thing. I’m miserable! I wanna start over elsewhere, build a new life. But I can’t do it on my own....please...’

Juan sighted, why did he have to be so weak for the beautiful?

‘I’ll...see what I can do..’

‘Thank you..’