Shards of wood and fine dust danced across the moist carcasses. The dull colours worn by the carriage occupants were painted in glimmering shades of red, ranging from the brightest of splatters flowing and spurting from the bodies to the lightest of pinks, sprinkling the roof and the luggage. Arms and legs stuck out of the hill of torsos as heads twisted at angles no head should ever be. Those who had their bodies laid in an anatomically possible position paid the equivalent exchange by having their facial features blown clean off, replaced with a cave of pulsing, squirting flesh.
Two men jumped in from the other end of the carriage, carrying shotguns on their backs as they climbed in. As soon as they got in, one of them took a glance at the bodies and quickly drew away their sight.
"What," the other one spoke. He sported a shaved head with a deep scar running from the back of his neck to the bridge of his nose, "You 'fraid?"
"The smell," the man replied as he tied a ragged bandana over his nose. Despite his words, his eyes were still darted away from the carnage.
"Expect to see more like this, kid," the bald man said. He looked around the bodies, raising limbs as he checked the bodies, "Almighty, look at the bodies. I think we've hit a fortune."
"Y-yeah," the bandana man poked on one of the bodies.
"C'mon now, get down," the bald man gestured towards the bandana man, "Help me pull this whore out of this fatass. If she's complete we could cut away the bad parts and sell her-"
"Wait," the bandana man said.
The bald man looked up, "What?"
He pulled his shotgun out, poking on one specific body amongst the unrecognisable pile.
"I think this one's breath-"
His next words weren't as coherent. Compared to his nervous tone, his subsequent voice was grisly and painful and not at all resemble actual speech. It sounded more like a shriek from a Bantam with its tail blown clean off. He jolted into a shock, flinging his limbs to the side as his ankle got crushed with one fierce metallic grip. Wet cracks snapped out of his bones as juices sprayed from the seams of the metal fist.
The bald man tensed up for a moment, caught off guard by the bandana man's grody scream. He quickly shook himself back to reality and threw his arm to his back, frantically grabbing his shotgun. Before he could even bring the sawed-off barrel over his shoulder the metal fist ripped a fat, bloody chunk off the bandana man's ankle and lobbed it right towards the bald man's face, metal fingers and all. The bald man jerked up his elbow but to no avail. His shattered arm was sent into a joint-first dive into his nose, crushing deep down into his jaw. His eyes now crisscrossed against one another as his skull caved into the innards of his scalp. His limbs fell into a limp and joined the bodies below as one.
As the bandana man struggled to stay upright, the metal arm slithered away from the bald man's corpse, raising itself amongst the pile of remains. The man with the metal arm rose, his face drenched in thick, chunky red, his hair hardened and sticky from the fluids. He rose to a kneel, revealing a messy dent in his metal shoulder. A good chunk of his shoulder was blown off, but otherwise, the nerves were still attached and very much sensitive.
The bandana man slowly slipped downwards, descending onto his bloody wound as the man with the metal arm rose in his sight. Under his messy hair, the man with the metal arm glared down onto him like a beast to its prey. The bandana man struggled his hold onto his shotgun. His fingers trembled under the pump as he wrestled with his stricken nerves to lift the barrel.
In one quick flick, the man with the metal arm grabbed onto the bandana man's throat. His fingers clasped on the side, pushing deeper as he loomed over his tear-ridden face.
"Not now, not here," he growled, "Not until I get to him."
Doused in fear and rid of any calm rationality, all the bandana man could voice out was, "W-who?"
The man with the metal arm was about to answer when he caught sight of the bandana man's shotgun. More specifically, the stock. With his opposite, flesh-covered arm he wrangled the warm barrel from the bandana man's arm and took a good, long look at it. A logo was chiselled onto the wooden butt. It was a shape of a skull, with its eyes replaced with crosses. Below the teeth were what seemed to be a poor rendition of breasts, portrayed by uneven, asymmetrical curves.
The man with the metal arm drew his glare back to the bandana man.
"Your boss."
Then he ripped his neck out, dragging along with him more flesh, nerves, and a soft, soggy pipe connecting his head and his chest. The bandana man's eyes widened for a good second before his pupils rolled upwards, his eyelids sinking slightly as his body grew loose. His bandana grew a wet stain from where his mouth was, forming crimson droplets off the tip as the stain spread to the edges. His body turned lax and fell backwards, landing on his head as he dropped on his knees. His chest pulsed out for quite some time before sinking to stagnancy, eventually turning motionless.
The man with the metal arm took a good look at the body before he drew himself up. He paused for a moment, grabbing onto his wound behind his shoulder. He rummaged amongst the corpses and grabbed onto a bag. It only had one sling and an empty pocket on the side with its end bottoming out into raggedy frays.
He held the bag over his good shoulder and popped his head out the carriage, into the still, hot air when another boom exploded from the side, setting fire to the air as it blew his scalp off into chunks. His limbs immediately went dead as his torso slumped over the end, his legs still hanging onto the carriage. His chest dropped down along his bag and what remained of his head, dangling over the edge.
Another person came into view. It was a woman this time, short-haired and dressed in a black, solid, frazzled vest, a tank top underneath and a thick, ragged coat over everything else. She held a smoking shotgun, similar to the ones belonging to the recently deceased in the carriage in one hand and a silver pistol on the other. She drew her eyes over to the corpses, staring longingly at the bandana man's overturned eyes.
"I liked that kid," she said.
The woman in the vest drew her pistol up and put two bullets into the head of the dead man with the metal arm. The shots rang softer than the shotgun blast but still echoed across the valley, like hallowed, iron shrieks towards the empty sky.
"Mugi! Rahman! Cut off his arm and take his bag," she barked as she under her vest and pulled out a short machete. She dropped it on the ground as she called out, "After that, grab Raj and Ejaz out. Before that, shoot everyone else in the head."
Immediately, two more men came into view. The woman in the vest stepped away from the carriage, pulling out a cigarette and a lighter from her vest as the men grabbed onto the dead man with the metal arm, dragging his legs out and dropping him onto the cracked road.
One of the men wore a bandaged adjacent to his nose, stretching across his left eye. He spoke to his partner, "Wanna do this guy first or the other guys first?"
The other man looked at him. He lifted his left hand, made an incomplete fist; his pinky was missing; and drew it towards the bandaged man.
"If I win we do the other guys first," he said, "You lose, I'll do the other guys myself, but you have to stay here and cut the guy's arm yourself."
"This is why you lost a finger in the first place," the bandaged man said.
The man with the missing finger smirked, "You a Bantam?"
The bandaged man drew a fist of his own, "You're on."
They tapped their fist on their palms three times and showed their hand. The bandaged man drew a fist himself while the man with the missing finger drew an incomplete, open palm.
"Screw you," the bandaged man said as he picked up the machete.
"Almighty bless the missing finger," the man with the missing finger snarked as he climbed into the carriage.
The bandaged man began from the bag. He pulled it out from the dead man's limp arm and checked its content. There was a dull, plastic gun inside. He racked the slide twice and left the port open on the second pull. There was a bullet inside. He pressed against the magazine catch and checked the magazine. A full case. He checked the bag for more. There were three more full cases.
Jackpot, he thought.
He rummaged through the bag some more. Among the trinkets and food supplies, he found a photo. It was a stained, yellowed photo. There the man with the metal arm stood, this time without the metal arm but a fully organic arm instead. He held a gentle smile, something permanently impossible for him given his current predicament. Beside him stood a girl in a light dress with a radiant smile. The bandaged man gazed into the photo deeper with his one good eye. He looked at the girl's legs. Even within the deteriorating photo, he could see her swelling thighs and slender calves, flowing to her shapely ankles and her toes, pushed together in a neat, plump bunch in a pair of sandals. He kept the photo in his pocket, thinking he could find great use of it at night.
He stuffed the gun and the bullets and the trinkets and the food supplies back into the bag, tossed it aside and lifted the machete. He chopped into the dead man's shoulder and left it stuck in there. He stood up, lifted his foot and stomped onto the blade with his steel-heeled boot. He felt his kneecaps wobble violently as a loud clang rang from his shoulder. The bandaged man fell over as tears rolled from his good eye. The impact managed to spread to a soft spot in his leg.
As soon as he recovered he retrieved the machete from the dead man's arm. He opened the dead man's wound, checking to see what the hell was in his shoulder that managed to stop his heel. Within his flesh was a metal pole extending from his prosthetic arm to his neck. It went deeper than he expected.
"Mugi," the bandaged man called out, "We've got a problem."
He checked the dead man's arm some more. He tried pulling the arm out. It was like lifting a boulder lodged into the ground, or pulling a stick out of dried mud. It wouldn't budge at all, at least with one man's strength.
"Mugi," he called out again. A second passed. Two seconds passed.
Five seconds passed.
"Mugi?"
Thanks for the chapter