The rumbling of a gang of motorcycles passed by as I made my way back out to the front of the coffee shop I’d been hiding in, the cold grip of the P850 reassuring me that I could defend myself. I could barely see in the darkness that now enveloped the area, though I still felt far safer with the distant gunfire and darkness than I ever had when silence reigned.

I ran across the street with my gun raised, moving into the opposite building with as much care as I could muster while still being quick about it. Flicking on my lighter once again, I found myself in a small grocery store, cash registers all emptied and shopping carts haphazardly strewn about. The lights flickered on as I took another few steps in, and I flinched back. I almost yelped in surprise, having expected there to be no power anywhere. The coffee shop certainly didn’t have any. I clipped one of the four grenades to my bandolier in case of an emergency. Something was wrong about this place.

I had no idea what I was looking for here, though after wandering through aisles of empty shelving I realized something that should’ve been obvious in hindsight. If there was power, it was coming from somewhere. If it was coming from somewhere, that might mean possible loot.

I ran for the back rooms, my gut telling me that the light might draw bandits or worse to the area. Hopefully there was also a back door I could use for when I left.

The back area was small, barely big enough for one semi to fit in the loading dock. The storage shelving had little of value, already picked clean by bandits or scavengers. However, what really caught my eye were the stairs leading down, a trail of dried blood telling me that something dangerous might lurk below. The worst part was that the lights down there were flickering on and off to the point that it seemed reminiscent of a horror film.

“Why does everything need to be so dark?” I glanced around for anything resembling a club. The closest I could get would’ve been a broom handle. P850 aiming ahead of me, I descended into the basement, the flickering lights and exceptionally muffled sounds of the outside world making me feel very alone.

Despite my desire to move hastily I skulked through the basement, my boots making only a hint of noise as I moved away from the trail of blood, to the more abundant storage shelves filling the room. The flickering lights barely allowed me a glimpse of what I was looking at most of the time. Some of it was food, some of it was tools I couldn't carry or had no use for, though I did find a hatchet in decent condition. The handle was steel with a rubber grip, light and easy in my left hand. I gave it a few swings to get a good read on how it might feel in a combat scenario, nodding to myself in satisfaction.

A sucking sound pulled me from my experimenting, my gaze snapping toward where the blood trail led, a large hole leading straight down into the ground. Right next to it was a black crate that looked out of place in the rural grocery store aesthetic. It was covered in dried blood, as was the immediate area around the hole, bones scattered about. Some had been broken, others gnawed on.

I saw a bulbous leg shove its way out of the hole, before another joined it, both pulling a fleshy mass, fresh blood being dumped from new cuts and scrapes, the hole not nearly big enough to accommodate the monster I was currently looking at.

Well, that explains why nobody looted this place.

The flickering lights only added to the horror show as blood and a translucent ichor flowed from both wounds and various orifices alike. The legs disappeared under what was little more than an amorphous blob of meat, each orifice lined with endless rows of teeth.

The first grenade was out of my hand and flying across the room before I’d even begun to back up. I reached for my bag just as the small explosive sank into its shifting body. A few seconds later, there was a pop comparable to a gunshot, and the leaking blood splattered everywhere, the abomination screeching as it writhed and recoiled in on itself. It did a solid amount of damage but on the outside it looked almost unharmed, its body rearranging itself once more until the bloody mess was hidden away entirely. There hadn’t even been any excessive shrapnel flying out of its body, just the slightly muffled explosion and the screech.

I holstered the P850, pulling two more grenades from my bag. If one wasn’t going to immediately kill it, I’d use two. Pins were pulled and explosives lobbed into the creature's body, one of the orifices catching the grenade and seeming to swallow it, the orifice closing as it began to flow toward me, simply moving through the shelves and items they contained.

Both explosives went off, sending chunks flying up into the ceiling and shelves with meaty thwacking noises. I even had to duck underneath one as I was sprayed with blood, thick and oily. It was positively disgusting, the warmth and wetness of it enough to make me gag as the thing shrieked once again.

I stumbled backward toward the stairs as I looked for another way to kill the flesh abomination. The grenades were working, but not nearly well enough. I could finish it off if I had maybe three more, but with only one remaining, my options were looking pretty slim. I looked at the black box that sat behind the monster, debating on whether or not I should try and risk seeing if I could open it. If I was lucky I’d manage to get it open, and find a weapon inside capable of hurting the monster more. If I was unlucky… I looked at the leaking mouths with rows of teeth. They didn’t look very pleasant regardless of how little pain one might feel.

As I weighed the risks the blob undulated ever closer to me, its many mouths moving and leaking ever more fluid. The grenades had seemingly stunned it with each hit, enough that I might be able to slip by if I were sprinting. Either I took the risk and used my last grenade, or I backed off and wasted precious explosives for nothing.

Momma didn’t raise no bitch.

I threw the last grenade and ran forward a second later, the explosive going off just as I reached the fleshy blob. It reached for me faster than I could react, only to recoil immediately as the grenade went off inside it, shuddering horrifically as I splashed through the translucent ichor it had been leaking. I didn’t even bother trying to slow down, just dropping to the ground and sliding up to the box, my legs slamming against it hard, the physical display turning yellow around my shins as my health dropped.

It was drenched in fresh blood and ichor, the locking mechanism entirely unknown to me. There was nothing electronic on it and no clear latches. My hands slipped against the top of the box as I tried to lift it, shove it, anything that might get it to open. Nothing was working. In a panic I shoved the blade of the hatchet into the seam and began heaving with all my might, thankful for the rubber grip. The abomination moved toward me again, shoving shelves aside instead of simply flowing through them this time. I pulled harder, finally hearing a snap as I fell back to the ground.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that instead of the hatchet breaking, the box had instead, some hidden strength check probably being why I’d managed to get it open. Moving around to keep the box between me and the blob, I looked through the contents hastily while shoving the hatchet into my bag, hoping to find something to hurt and possibly kill the beast.

My luck held steady as I found a gun that would absolutely wreck this thing. I even had two shots for it.

-----------------------

Echelon 40mm BLGL

“For when you see something and you really don’t want to, choose Echelon.”

Green Uncommon Firearm

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I grabbed the two forty millimeter rounds along with the solid black steel grenade launcher, moving as far back as I could physically manage, despite the remaining loot inside. If I lost the rest of it within the next minute I wouldn’t care, so long as I got to keep what I believed was now my new favorite toy.

I found the button to release the breech, loading in the first round and locking the barrel in place. I placed the hard polymer stock against my shoulder and took aim, hoping that the recoil wouldn’t send the shot careening into a wall or anything still holding flammable gas.

Digging in my heels even as the blood and ichor threatened to bring me to the floor, I pulled the trigger, a satisfying thump echoing out into the room as the forty millimeter round slammed deep into the mass of flesh, before the monster exploded in a fountain of blood, dying right then and there. I hadn't expected it to be that powerful. Neat.

The blood and flesh then shattered into fragments of light, even blinding me a bit as all that had covered me disappeared, leaving me clean as a whistle. It was then that I noticed my health had been ticking down the whole time, a damage over time icon disappearing. My eye twitched a bit upon seeing my health in the red.

--------------------------

Congratulations, you have just completed the Horror Show dungeon!

One food resource point has been delivered to the city of Bastion for your achievement!

Bonus: For completing the Horror Show dungeon alone, you have been awarded 1000 credits!

--------------------------

Seeing the notification, I couldn’t the laughter that bubbled up from my chest, which soon turned into cackling like a madman. It had been a long time since I’d actually done something this crazy in a game on my own, even if it had been pretty tame with all the grenades I’d used. I had forgotten just how much I enjoyed the thrill of it. Walking back to the box of items, the lights still flickering while the hole remained full of a horrid black liquid, I ran my hand along the barrel of the grenade launcher. The outside of the barrel was octagonal in a way that felt lovely to me, and it was even surprisingly easy to grip, something I hadn’t noticed in my desperation to kill the flesh monster.

The rest of the items in the box were fairly decent. There was a green quality knife, a pistol that looked similar to the Recycler Rifle in the fact that there was nowhere to load a magazine, and that I had to pull a t-shaped charging handle back before it could fire. There was even an actual medical kit, complete with bandages, medicines, and a curved needle for sutures.

I put everything except the pistol away, and gave it a test fire into the hole. A sliver of bluish white energy shot out of the barrel and disappeared into the black liquid, the charging handle slamming forward before moving back again of its own accord.

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Recycler Pistol

“When one of two people runs out of ammo, who would you rather be? The guy with a useless hunk of metal, or the guy holding this?”

Green Uncommon Energy Firearm

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It had the look of an old Nambu pistol, the angled grip made up of mostly wood, the gun barrel being little more than a tube with a blue light attached to the iron sights at the end. I turned it over several times in my hands, wondering why both it and the Recycler Rifle both seemed to resemble much older weapons.

I stopped musing when I heard shouting from inside the store above me. I ran for the stairs, hoping I wouldn’t have to get into a shootout with the abysmal amount of health I had left. I managed to sneak out the back just as I heard them making their way into the back room. A few minutes of patience and I was back in the sewers. While it seemed relatively safe, it still smelled absolutely awful.