Returning to the Military Enclave, the superpowered prisoners discover they weren’t the only people dealing with a zombie issue.
Intro Music: Hitman by Kevin Macleod
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See, my first thought was that the Patrician had snapped the elevator cables, causing the elevator to fall far/fast enough to plumet through a thinning in the upper most cavern of the Hollow Earth, crushing a Great Earthworm mid-rampage.
The crumbled remains of the elevator sit proudly displayed in the last of Treasure Vault of the Last Settlement of the Mole Men. While they pray to Dreaded Sky Box every night, covetus glittering multifaceted eyes have begun the appear at the very edge of their senses, haunting jeers of “Ka-cha”echoing of the halls of Mole Town…
The people inside the elevator quivered in fear as it was slowly but surely pulled up and up and up. And pulled is the correct term as far above them on the surface was earths mightiest hero and now it’s greatest threat. The Patrician.
“Come to me my lil snack box,” the Patrician mocked as he pulled the elevator up by the metal cables, this was sure to be their doom.
But something happened, the elevator had stopped, Sarah had pushed the down button and surprisingly it worked however the Patrician was not to be denied so he gathered his strength and pulled harder.
Nothing happened so he pulled even harder. Wires, cables, the steel elevator shaft all grained with the force yet nothing would give. The elevator refused to break.
Until it did.
The Patrician was surprised as he watched the elevator fly out of its shaft, break through the roof and leave Earths atmosphere.
Well there was more snacks in the base below anyway.
(This turned into a very long answer to a very short question but seeing everyone else comments made me want to post my answer as well)
When Alya Najar was a kid she wanted to grow up to be a superhero; unfortunately the only power she ever seemed to have was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
When she was 6 that meant that she got blamed when her brother accidentally broke the TV.
When she was 12 that meant that she was the one holding the bag when her friends got caught shoplifting.
When she was 19 that meant that she was in the army recruitment office when the apocalypse started.
When she was 24 that meant that she had just stepped into the elevator with a few other soldiers when the Patrition arrived and started slaughtering people.
The ground shook below them and there was screaming and gunfire above them. There was not a man nor woman in that elevator who was prepared for the juggernaut that would doubtlessly rain down death and destruction upon them. A few soldiers kept their guns trained on the ceiling in some futile hope to defend themselves, more just stood mortified at the thought of being bitten and turned. One soldier was even eyeing the barrel of their gun, presumably to get it over with.
Alya on the other hand, did the only things she could; she closed her eyes and cursed her terrible, horrid luck. She took a deep breath and felt a surge go through her. She was weightless and timeless for a moment then it all came crashing down. There was a flash and the ground shifted under her. The elevator dropped to the ground, but only a few feet, landing in a thud on soft dirt ground. There was silence broken by a soft “Ding†of the doors opening. It was night out now. Looking out the door they could see the base as a spec in the distance, with smoke rising from fires that had long since burned themselves out.
In the stunned confusion of the soldiers all Alya could think that was after all these years she really should have known; the only power she ever had was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
(Everybody here is AWESOME!
Sam, I thought I’d take a stab at continuing your story for the heck of it)
Alya Najar pressed herself against the corner of the elevator, her arms wrapped around her knees. It was cold in the elevator – the door was open and she didn’t know how far they were up in the air. At one point, they had been flown through a minor rain storm which drenched the inside of the elevator and the occupants huddled inside.
The elevator had started with six people – including herself. Five soldiers who at first aimed their rifles up towards the ceiling as the elevator grew higher and higher. In the last two hours of the flight, that number had dropped. One soldier had opted to press the muzzle of his pistol against the side of his head and pull the trigger – too bad a slight jostle from wind screwed up his aim and it didn’t kill him. Alya had tried her best to stop the bleeding, and when that didn’t matter, she just tried to be there for the boy wailing for his mother. That had been a horrible ten minutes – one of the soldiers opting to rid himself of the noise and fear by jumping from the open doorway.
When the boy finally succumbed to his head wound, the remaining three soldiers pushed his body out of the elevator and Alya just found her corner. The soldiers each found their own corner. And they all sat there, awaiting their death.
The Patrician had devoured the world. He had taken on the Guardian League and turned them into something twisted and… wrong. Alya had the worst luck of being stuck away from her family when the End came. She had followed a friend to a recruitment drive for the army and from there, she had been conscripted. Field Tech – whatever that meant. She hadn’t had to leave the base since they were brought there – not with the Metas that had been leashed by the General.
Alya felt a twinge of guilt try to knot its way into her stomach.
Alya never liked how they treated the Metas. She remembered seeing Blackout once when Alya had been tasked with reinforcing the mesh wiring in front of the lights in the woman’s cell. The girl looked… well, she looked like someone Alya would have gone to the mall with and complained about boys too. She looked like someone she would have gotten along with before Z-Day. Or maybe she did before the General locked her away. The girl was… broken. Counting. Steps, breaths, heartbeats. She had been stuck in the cell for god knows how long with only the buzzing of the lights and the deep bright…
And Alya had gone along with it because at least she could hide away from the monsters above ground. Away from the dead, away from the death, and away from the Patrician.
Alya wasn’t a bad person. She knew this. But she also knew she deserved to be here in this elevator for what she ignored in that base.
The elevator’s ceiling squealed as a hand punched through it. Strong. Powerful. Rotted. Decayed. Fingers coiled around the metal above them before giving a hard yank, ripping the elevator open as if it was the top of a sardine can. Alya heard screaming – and then realized it was coming from her. The soldiers were standing at their feet, rifles aimed as they fired through the newly created hole.
Alya used to have a poster of the Patrician – he had been her schoolgirl crush. She had fallen for his refined features and strong jawline the instance she saw him on the News fighting the Terror Twins when she was eight. She had secretly even written fanfiction about the two of them meeting, falling in love, and making passionate love on top of Century Tower in Arrant City .
This was not the man who was the star of her fanfiction. His skin was stretched taut over his cheeks, his teeth clicking in excitement as he stared down at the trapped occupants with cold, dead eyes. The bullets striking him did nothing – he didn’t even seem to notice them. Instead, he bore his gaze down through the hole, stripping away every hope and dream that Alya had that maybe there was still good in the man.
Alya had always been a magnet for bad luck. If there was going to be a bone broken on the playground, it would be her’s. If a car was going to run out of gas or a person was going to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, it was always, always, ALWAYS her. Alya was a creature that attracted bad luck. She was a magnet and she attracted it like bees to pollen. And when the Patrician dropped the elevator and it came crashing down on some random building, Alya body felt like it was swarming with every possible bad outcome in the entire city. Every stray bullet wanted to go to her. Every missed zombie yearned to sneak up on her. Every crumbling infrastructure wanted to bury her alive…
The Patrician crashed down in front of the elevator door.
And then Alya didn’t feel unlucky anymore. Her fear – her soul crushing fear of death – suddenly pushed all that bad luck away. Every future mistake, every karmic realignment was off her shoulders. And she… she willed it towards the Super Z in front of her.
The Patrician opened his mouth – maybe to gloat, maybe to monologue – but he never got to start nor finish it. Instead, the Patrician just had what the world would call ‘bad luck’. The moment when he was stepping towards the elevator with his lips parting to speak, bad luck struck at that infinitesimal moment when his weight wasn’t one hundred percent ‘locked’. The nearby pigeon coup hadn’t been disturbed in years, and with the sudden appearance of a living monster, the birds all opted to find new living arrangements. A flock of pigeons took off and slammed into the side of the Patrician at possibly the only millisecond where it would have altered his step. He stumbled to the side, smashing a generator off the side of the building. And as he turned back towards the cowering occupants of the elevator, he only had time to utter the very beginning of her threat when suddenly a cord snapped around his ankle.
A cord that had probably been connected to the generator that was plummeting to the ground currently.
The Patrician was strong – hell, probably the strongest – but even he could be surprised. One minute he was standing there, ready to bath in their blood, and the next – he was crying out in surprise as he was dragged over the ledge, plummeting down to the street below.
The soldiers and Ayla stared in confused silence for a second before one reached out, grabbed her shoulder, and screamed for everyone to run.
This was the moment Ayla would remember when people would ask her what her origin story was. This was the moment she realized she actually had powers. This was the moment where Ayla was reborn as Miss Hap.
Does this count as you writing fanfiction of my fanfiction which includes this character writing fanfiction? (so meta)
Either way I am totally floored by how awesome this is! Thanks for your addition Billy!
Surely technician (3rd class) Ayla Wail (otherwise Miss Hap) must be making an appearance in a future instalment of Rotted Capes?
I will say this – if the woman does ever appear in a game again, she will not have that much ‘influence’ over the Patrician again.
Ayla Wail (otherwise Miss Hap) had been collecting 26 years worth of bad luck before she threw all of it right at the mightiest of Super Z’s. And it distracted him for a ten minutes. She’ll probably never be able to ‘hex’ someone as powerful as the Patrician again unless she held off on using her powers for another 26 years.
But I can’t say I’d be surprised if Miss Hap appeared somewhere down the line in the Rotted Capes’ story 😀
You see the real tick to getting the most out of this power is charging up your bad luck in as many minor ways as possible. Playing cards, making bets, letting coin flips and drawing straws decide who gets to sleep in the real bed tonight; that way you have a consistent stream of minor misfortune you can unleash when you need it.
The side effect however would be having a hero who is always going to lose at all the little things, and that would probably be pretty grating for her, even if there are realistically bigger things to worry about. (having to survive the apocalypse with no small victories, no brief respites from the hell that is your life; That would probably get to someone pretty fast)
Possibly. Unless the minor things don’t count. After all winning or losing the coin toss, who gives a flip? Unless of course you bet something like your house on it. Perhaps you could sustain minor wounds, have your mooks drop like flies around you, trip over as the pack of Zs is on your heels? Forget the bagels to an all night gaming session when it’s your turn. Things that matter and could get you hurt. Then you might build up your karmic currency. How much can you endure to inflict on others? 26 years could depend on how much pain you can pack in to it……