Kyle West - Revelation

“Where are they now?” I asked.

“Everyone works in Vegas,” Michael said. “They’re out in the fields, on the lake. I don’t want them to be out there, but there’s little choice. Anyone who can’t fight, works. I see them at night, though, when they come home.”

I picked up the story where I’d left off. I had to tell him about Makara first.

“Do you remember when you were with me on my first recon, and we came across the man from Bunker 114?”

Michael nodded, his brown eyes haunted. “How could I forget? That’s what started it all.”

“Well, at Bunker 114, they were studying the xenovirus. One of their test subjects escaped, infecting the first person it encountered. The xenovirus just…spread. That person we found — he had escaped from Bunker 114, and was coming to 108 for help, or to warn us. I still have no idea why Chan let him in that night.”

“So, what is the xenovirus?” Michael said. “I know from what you’ve said so far that it causes the Blighters.”

“It’s an alien virus that was buried in Ragnarok. It spreads the xenofungus. And now, it infects humans, turning them into Howlers. It created the xenodragons you now see flying around.”

“How do you know all this?” Michael asked.

“Makara, Samuel, Anna, and me…we’ve been through a lot. After Khloe died, I wandered the Wasteland for about a week before running into Makara. There’s something I need to admit — I saw her there, Michael. When we found that man, I saw her watching in the distance from behind a rock, but I didn’t say anything.”

Michael hesitated a moment, then finally understood what I was saying. “Why did you stay quiet?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know. Something kept me. I guess it was the shock more than anything. Makara ended up hiding again, and it was only later that I learned that she, or at least some of the raiders she was with, killed that man. Makara said they found him on the road, and that he was sick at the time.”

Michael’s expression darkened. “If she hadn’t had done that…” He looked at me. “If you had just said something…”

“I’ve thought about it a lot since then,” I said. “I’m not sure if anything could have been prevented. I think CSO Chan might have been expecting that guy from 114. He sure let him in quickly enough.”

“I don’t know about that,” Michael said. “I mean, wouldn’t Chan have said something to us? He probably would have said something to me, the senior patrol leader. I knew nothing about a visitor from Bunker 114.”

“Maybe not, then,” I said. “Whatever the case, I feel like the CSO knew something we didn’t. He might have known what happened at Bunker 114 even before we did.”

“So, it really is gone?”

I nodded. “Yeah. There’s nothing left. We’ve tried contacting other Bunkers, but nothing.”

Michael was quiet for a moment. “I was hoping for some good news, there. I was hoping that me and my family could leave here, one day, and find another Bunker, somewhere. I guess that won’t happen now.”

“Whatever happened,” I said, “Chan allowed that man inside Bunker 108. Maybe he saw it as a way to increase our understanding of the xenovirus. I didn’t see that at the time, but looking back, I think that might be why he let him in. He wanted news of Bunker 114’s fall. Both my father and Chan had no idea what would happen that night.”

“And the rest is history.” Michael shook his head. “It’s amazing we survived. Without my family, I don’t think I could have found the will to carry on.”

“I was the same way, until I met Makara. Long story short, we ended up in Bunker 114 not too long after, when Makara learned that her brother, Samuel, had gone there to investigate its fall. He led a team out of Oasis, and all of them ended up dying except for him. Well, we got into the Bunker, and discover something in its digital archive called the Black Files.”

“The Black Files?”

I nodded. “It’s just as bad as it sounds. The Black Files hinted at what the origins of the xenovirus were. And if we knew the origins, we might be able to find a way to stop it. But the Black Files weren’t in Bunker 114.”

“Where were they?” Michael asked.

“Bunker One.”

“And you went there?”

“Yes, but it wasn’t easy.”

Michael smiled. “Damn, it seems like you’ve seen more fighting in your first week out of 108 than I’ve seen in my life.”

“I’m surprised I’m still alive,” I said. “But we discovered the Black Files in Bunker One, in Cheyenne Mountain.”

“You just flat out went across the Great Blight?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We had no idea what we were in for.”

Michael shook his head again, eyes wide. “You’ve got brass balls, buddy.”

“Well, it was Samuel’s idea,” I said. “I wanted to just hole up in Oasis, to be honest.”

“So you crossed the Great Blight and found the Black Files. What happened after that?”

“Well, between all that I met Anna. She was Char’s personal bodyguard in Raider Bluff, and she agreed to guide us to the Great Blight. She ended up keeping her path crossed with ours. Now she’s here, helping us.”

“Anna,” Michael said, “all I have to say is, I’m sorry you met this guy.”

Anna smiled. “Yeah, well, I’ve decided to just roll with it at this point.”

“She’s an expert katana user,” I said. “Just wait until you hear about our vacation to Mexico.”

“Interesting choice of word there,” Anna said.

“I’ll fill in the details later,” I said, “but yeah, we made it to Bunker One, found the Black Files, and learned about the xenovirus. If no one stops it, the xenovirus will take over the world. So now, it’s kind of our crazy mission to stop it. What’s worse, there is this alien consciousness, located in Ragnarok Crater, called the Voice. We don’t know exactly where it comes from, but it seems to be directing all xenolife.”

“Well,” Michael said, pointing westward, “I don’t need any Black Files to tell me the world is being taken over. I see it every day.”

“Marcus said the exact same thing.”

“So, where does the spaceship come in?”

“About now, actually. After we discovered the Black Files, the Voice recognized that we were there, and sent an entire swarm after us. We managed to make it to Bunker One’s runway alive, but we were completely surrounded. We were about to die, when out of nowhere, a spaceship came down from the sky, extending a ladder for us to board.”

“Alright, that’s a little bit unbelievable…” Michael said.

“Well, it’ll make sense in a second. I’m leaving out a lot of details, but the spaceship turned out to be piloted by a man named Dr. Cornelius Ashton — the very author of the Black Files we had found. He had contacted us in the lab beforehand about getting to the runway. Anyway, we got into the spaceship, escaping the snapping jaws of death. Soon, we found ourselves living in a space city called Skyhome.”

“Skyhome?”

“The U.S. Government constructed it during the Dark Decade,” I said. “It was top secret, and intended as a backup for the President in case things on Earth went to hell. Which they did, but President Garland couldn’t escape Bunker One in time. However, Dr. Cornelius Ashton did, back in 2048. He has lived there with a community of Bunker survivors since then, continuing his research on the xenovirus — such as he can.”

“So, you’ve been in fallen Bunkers, the Great Blight, outer space…and then, Mexico?”

“That happened after. We were attempting to negotiate peace between Raider Bluff and Nova Roma. We had to meet Emperor Augustus to do that. But that didn’t work out. Mixed in with all that were slavers, gladiatorial matches, and finally, the dragons.”