Doomsday kicked off with the ground groaning and sinking, like, everywhere.
Freakin' huge cracks ripped the earth wide open, letting loose these massive, weird-ass roots that just started crawling upwards.
Felt like the whole damn planet was trying to squeeze out something horrifying.
And there, mixed in with those messed-up roots, this... fruit thing showed up. Looked like a goddamn human heart, covered in sharp, pitch-black thorns, and it was throbbing like it was actually alive.
The folks who made it through? They ended up calling it "Life's Flesh."
At first, people were all like, "Oh, it's a holy gift from God, after everything went to shit."
But the real deal? It was a bio-weapon, eating away at humanity from the inside out.
Governments everywhere tried to shut that shit down, but you know how people are too damn curious, or maybe just plain desperate. So, tons of them still went for it, still chose to touch the stuff.
Some on purpose, some just fucked up and stumbled into it.
Then the first roar hit. And after that, a whole goddamn chorus of them, from every freaking corner of the globe…
The sound of the "Vineborn" creatures twisted into being by that Flesh.
Human bodies got all twisted, torn apart, and then slammed back together in some seriously fucked-up ways.
Skin split open, showing muscles twitching underneath, all running on pure, savage instinct.
Some of these things got freaky, terrifying powers.
Then you had the others the ones who somehow kept their minds, stuck in those godawful bodies. They became an even bigger, meaner threat.
The weaker ones? Poof. Gone in a blink.
Then you had the sneaky bastards those who touched it and seemed totally fine, at least at first. Yeah, they just turned into walking time bombs.
Nobody had a damn clue if they were actually safe, or if the person right next to them was gonna suddenly... you know, not be.
Cities? Wrecked. Soldiers? Dead. Governments? Poof, gone lost all their damn power.
The rattle of machine guns got quieter and quieter, pretty much drowned out by the goddamn howls of the Vineborn packs.
Animals, plants, even nature itself wasn't safe from the mutation shitshow. Those roots just kept spreading, rewriting the old world with their own fucked-up rules
But hey, even in all that despair, sometimes the Flesh didn't just devour. Sometimes, it chose to... merge.
It'd light up some crazy-ass power inside a person, and they could actually control that energy, like, completely.
Gave 'em different kinds of superhuman shit. These were "The Awakened."
Humanity's last, flickering spark of hope, maybe. But there weren't many of 'em, and most stayed hidden, keeping a low profile.
This story? It digs its roots deep into Riverbend, some fringe city down south…
A place where you couldn't trust anyone. Like, really trust them. Not a hundred percent sure if anyone was still fully "human."
Wind howled through rust-eaten scrap metal in some dark, shitty alley in Riverbend.
Leon, a guy around eighteen, stood dead still in the shadows of a wrecked building.
His hair was jet-black, but shot through with a few white streaks here and there. His eyes, sharp as fuck, darted around, wary as hell.
A faded scar on his otherwise sharp-looking face told you his life hadn't been any kind of cakewalk.
His hands looked lean, but you could tell they were strong, like they knew how to hold on.
Leon? No last name. His folks dumped him in this survival-of-the-fittest shithole of a city as far back as he could remember. Said it was for "training" or some bullshit, then they just fucking vanished.
He grew up hungry, on the run, and fighting tooth and nail just to see the next day.
Riverbend molded him, alright. Made him a damn good observer, and a stone-cold opportunist when he had to be.
Weak sunlight licked at the rusted-out steel bones of Riverbend. Leon leaned against a wall in some narrow alley, a metal pipe resting next to him. His black-and-white hair stirred slightly. Those sharp-as-hell eyes of his were scanning, but not really landing on anything specific.
Scritch... hiss...
A sound from the trash. Leon just flicked a glance. Three or four mutated rats, poking their heads out from the shadows, their eyes blazing with a sickly, unnatural gleam. A wave of damp, musty air, laced with a faint, rank stench, drifted over.
"You fuckers again?" Leon muttered, instantly
clocking their numbers and where they were coming from. Three to the left, another one lurking behind that damn bin. He picked up the pipe, no rush. The cool metal felt familiar in his hand, like an old friend.
The one out front bared its teeth, getting ready to pounce.
Leon didn't give the fucker a chance. He kicked the toe of his boot into an old metal drum lying nearby.
CLANG!
The loud racket made the three mutated rats in front flinch, instinctively whipping their heads toward the sound.
That was the opening Leon needed.
He lunged for the closest one, the pipe in his hand whistling down with brutal precision.
THWACK!
A dull thud mixed with a short, sharp squeal as the small body went flying, slammed into the wall, and then lay still.
The other two snapped out of it, spinning back to snarl at him, pissed as hell.
Leon twisted, narrowly dodging the fangs of one that lunged at him from the side. His steel pipe whipped back, smashing into its ribs with full force.
SCREECH!
It shrieked, collapsing to twitch on the ground.
One left in front, and that other little bastard still hiding behind the bin.
Leon faked a charge at the one in the open. The second it braced itself, he switched directions hard, swinging the pipe in a wide arc behind the bin he'd clocked from the start.
CRASH! THWACK!
The clang of the toppling bin mixed with the solid thwack of metal hitting flesh. The mutated rat that had been lurking was taken out before it even knew what hit it.
The last rat still standing out front, watching its buddies get completely demolished, suddenly lost all its damn nerve. It twitched, eyes darting around, clearly looking for an escape route.
Leon wasn't about to let it go. He just tightened his grip on the pipe, closed in with a couple of quick, decisive steps, and finished it off with one clean, brutal thwack.
The faint, metallic tang of blood mixed with the swirling dust hanging heavy in the alley. Leon stood there for a beat, just looking at the four dead mutated rats, his expression totally flat. Then he snapped his fingers. Pop. Just once.
"Leon! Still screwing around with your old buddies, huh?"
Ava's clear voice cut through from the mouth of the alley. She strolled in, her short brown hair a total mess, like a bird that had a rough time in a windstorm. She took one look at the carnage in the alley and gave a small shake of her head.
"Skills haven't dulled a bit, I see. Cleaned 'em up good, same as always."
Leon just flicked his eyes over to Ava. "Business?" he asked, his voice flat, completely ignoring her usual brand of teasing praise or whatever greeting she'd tossed his way.
"Old Man Barton, of course," Ava said, pulling a face. She sauntered closer, her eyes doing a quick sweep of the rat bodies again. "Same old patrol around the perimeter. Except now, he's also bitching about 'that thing' again." She flicked a pointed look at the sky, and Leon caught the faint glint of worry in her eyes.
Leon tilted his head back, following her gaze to the brightening sky. Sunlight was starting to cut through with a bit more bite. A flicker of something deep in thought—there and gone in a flash—crossed his face. He ran a hand through his hair, a light touch, feeling the strands of white mixed in with the black. For a split second, a hidden knot of worry about... whatever the hell that was, tightened in his chest. "Red Mist?"
"Yeah, that's the one. Grumbling it's almost due again, I guess. Or maybe he's just looking for shit to bitch about, you know how old timers are,"
Ava sighed, a long one, then a small smile ghosted across her lips.
"Anyway, whatever. We should get a move on. If we're late, we're in for one of his marathon lectures, for sure. Plus, the patrol team's probably getting antsy. Without you running point for them, those idiots'll probably wander straight into a Vineborn nest, no doubt."
Leon just nodded, a quick, short jerk of his head. "Hmn." That's all he said, tucking away his own damn questions about the Red Mist for later. He gave the dead rats one last look, then started walking, leading Ava out of that cramped-ass alley.
All that was left behind was the faint smell of rust and the silence that settled back in. For a moment, anyway… because in Riverbend, silence never lasted long. Not for fucking long.