Exiled Lands

The road was a scar. Too straight to be the work of nature, too stubborn to fade with the ages. Its grey surface was not stone, nor metal, but something forged in an age that had outlived memory. Where it cracked, stubborn weeds and pale flowers pushed through, defiant. A testament to some long-forgotten apocalypse.       She walked it alone, the air heavy and still. In the distance, great skeletal towers clawed at the sky, their flanks plated in mottled metals that drank the sun without gleam. Along the roadside lay hollow wagons of fused steel and black wheels—unmoving, yet refusing to rot away like the wood and leather of her homeland. The land here did not decay; something preserved it, holding it in a half-dead stasis.       She brushed her fingers through the air and felt it again- the strange thrum beneath all things. Not magicka. Something rawer. Wilder. It pooled unseen in the earth and sky, heavy and wrong.

The first figure stepped from behind a rusting wagon, mask of glass and corroded steel hiding their face, a dusty leather vest hanging loose over their frame. Another emerged, then three more, each carrying strange weapons. Not swords, but short iron tubes bristling with unfamiliar mechanisms. They moved slowly, circling like wolves deciding which flank to bite.     “Oi there- Mutant!” one called, voice muffled behind the mask. “You look fresh off the isle. That real gold round your neck?”     She froze at the insult, her back straightening. “I can trace my lineage back three thousand generations. Who are you calling mutant?” Her voice was even, almost regal. Light coiled between her fingers- gold, pure, the mark of the gods she served. “The gold is not worth the price you would pay to take it.”     Their reply was laughter, sharp and ugly. One raised his weapon, and the air split with a sound sharper than thunder. The shot slammed into the road, ricocheting into the husk of a carriage and ringing inside its empty shell.     “You gonna give us a wrist-burn, aye?” the man taunted, grin twisting into a snarl. “Hand it over, or I put a slug through your melon witch.”

A new sound came from the ditch- a scrape of metal, a curse, and a slurred voice muttering. She glanced toward the wrecked wagon where the shot had landed. A man was slouched inside, arm dangling over the side, a bottle swinging from his hand. His faded jumpsuit was streaked with oil, and a crude metal box clung to his left forearm where a gauntlet might rest. His lips moved, then he mumbled to no one in particular, “Did one of you assholes just -shoot- me…?”     One of the masked figures barked back, “What you gonna do about it, junky? Walk away!”     The stranger didn’t. He lifted his head, staring around with bloodshot eyes, rubbing his temple as though calculating the shapes before him. For a heartbeat, she thought he might stumble off into the weeds. Then suddenly his hand dropped to a short, boxy weapon like the raiders’, though the craftsmanship was incomparable.     The next moments were fast and savage. A series of cracks, masked men running everywhere, one crumpling in the carnage. The man in the jumpsuit didn’t take cover, didn’t flinch. He moved forward in plain view, unhinged laughter spilling from his throat like a man unbound. Each shot he took was answered by wild return fire, but he didn’t slow, even when a bullet tore his side open.

When it ended, the survivors fled toward the overgrown towers.       He stood swaying, blood seeping down his side. She approached, light blooming in her palms. “Be still. You are wounded.”       The light spilled into him- warm, blessed, and divine.       He jerked violently, eyes wide, breath rasping. “That’s—” he coughed, voice raw. “That’s -rads-, lady!” His body shook, the smell of flash-cooked flesh curling up between them.       She snatched her hands back, startled.       “You need..” He coughed again, his knees bending as if the ground were pulling him under. “..You need to find shelter before it gets dark. I’ll explain at the crossroads east of here. Bring this-” He pressed the strange, heavy weapon into her palm, grip tight despite the blood on his fingers. “-was hell to find one in this condition..”

Then he sagged to the road, eyes fixed on something far away.       For a moment she knelt there, frozen, the echoes of violence still ringing in her ears. The stranger’s final words lingered, heavy as the weapon now resting in her palm. These lands had been erased from her people’s histories. Not by accident, but by intent. Forbidden. A place of exile, where the forgotten and the discarded were left to fade from memory.       She rose slowly, the weapon’s unfamiliar weight dragging at her arm. The air here felt different—thicker, hungrier—and for the first time in her long life she felt the truth settle in her chest. Whatever strength or status she had carried from home meant nothing in this place. She was a small fish in a very big pond.

Like a newborn, he came screaming back into the world. Pain was the only constant he had ever known, and the cloning process that dragged his mind into fresh flesh delivered every sensation in brutal clarity. He hit the concrete floor hard, gasping, slick with fluid.       The attending automatons lurched forward at once- welded nightmares cobbled together from decades of improvised repairs. They sprayed him with sterilization foam that seared across raw nerves, then blasted him with scalding air until his skin stung red. A moment later he was shivering in the dim light of the underground lab. Rows of empty chairs and silent workstations ringed his pod like a forgotten gallery. If he stared too long, he could almost see the ghosts of the scientists and doctors that use to watch him go through this very process centuries ago.

He muttered curses, forcing his body to move. That poor mutant woman wouldn’t last long out there. Dropping her into the wastes without explaining how her gifts tied into radiation.. it was cruel. She must never have met a biologic human in her entire life.       His bare feet carried him through the cracked halls until he involuntarily paused at a reinforced door. Its surface was gouged, warped, and scorched from his past attempts to breach it. He glared at it with old hatred. Beyond it lay his brain. His real brain. Wired into the neural network that anchored him to these cursed clone bodies. Someday he’d break through. Someday he’d end this nightmare. He had to concede it would not be today.

His path ended at one of his shrines to survival. Every bottle, ration, and cartridge had been scavenged, bartered, or stolen across centuries. Normally he only took what he needed. Today was a shopping spree.     From a hook he pulled a faded flight suit, once worn by pilots who had ripped through the skies in atomic-powered jets. It still held some nostalgic dignity, but he chose it out of utility for its pockets. He filled them quickly, then added a rucksack to the load. Munitions, dusty bottles of water, faded cans of military rations- enough to keep him and his new friend alive in relative comfort for a few weeks.     His most prized accessory was the medkit. People hesitated to kill a doctor. It also hid vices perfectly. Inside went a squat bottle of whiskey, outdated painkillers, and a jumble of local remedies-pressed pills, resin cakes, pungent poultices. Weaker than the old-world drugs, but they distracted him enough to keep going. His mind worked best with distractions.

Loaded down until his stride grew stiff, he finally turned toward his true treasure. Whatever magical kingdom that elf came from, she’d never imagine his crown jewel.     The car.     It waited in a dust-choked garage, hidden behind a false wall and a ramp to the surface. The emblem had long since fallen away, paint flaking like dead skin. When he turned the key it squealed, coughed, and backfired like a dying animal.     And he smiled. For a moment, he let himself drink it in.     The old girl had one more run left. The atomic battery leaked, the belt slipped, the oil was sludge. None of that mattered once the engine roared back to life. With the wind in his hair and the road ahead, it might as well have been a brand-new supercar.

He gunned it, weaving through wrecks and weeds like an obstacle course. The Crossroads loomed in his mind. He had to beat her there, make sure another ambush wasn’t waiting. He’d tell anyone who asked it was out of noble duty. Or maybe a vague familiar connection to someone he used to know. The truth was simpler.     He was criminally bored. And morbidly fascinated.       For all his years, he still didn’t understand how the mutants bent radiation into energy. That mystery, that last riddle, kept him tethered here. He’d never managed to speak with one before they were killed or swept into the mushroom-house cult. This time, it would be different.