♔ Champion ♔ Walking in a [Nuclear] Winter Wonderland — December 2024 Challenge Winner

[firefly]

[ A continuation from the December 2024 challenge entry by Rimechapel - "An Old World Holiday" ]
TW: mild horror

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The android stood stock-still, with the kind of patience that you could only exhibit if it was hard wired into your system, while a pair of gigantic antennae fluttered excitedly over its face plate.

< ma'am, please accept the package transfer. >

The antennae continued to flutter, pressing curiously into the gaps of its auditory sensors.

< ma'am, please. >

The fluttering paused, and two, long limbs covered in hundreds of trichoid sensilla hairs came up to smoothly wipe the remnants of acid rain that the antennae had picked up off the android.

~ I do not know ma'am. Ma'am does not live here. ~

The voice was more like a moan, and electronic in nature. Like something heard over a radio, or more accurately, as the accompanying audio to certain types of adult films the humans used to enjoy back in the old world.

The vox collar, from where the sultry moaning emitted, trilled from its position around the insectoid's thin neck. Normally, vocalisers such as hers used pleasant, generic sounding voice programs to provide the real-time translations needed in multi-species societies, but an unfortunate accident had rendered hers...broken. Whatever she did, she could not switch the program away from the "special edition" setting its previous owner had added to its registry for whatever reason.

~ I am not ma'am ~ She sighed seductively (unintentionally).

A pair of vicious-looking chelicerae just above the vocaliser chittered together in what might have been mild agitation (it's typically difficult for the average person to correctly interpret the body language of all insectoid species) and the seven–foot tall Vyx (a completely normal height for the females) stared at him expectantly with all of her compound eyes. They moved independently of each other, roaming over the android's acid-dappled body with an unnerving intensity.

There was a long pause during which the androids blank face plate - that although was completely void of any emotional or discernible expression, seemed to exhibit a pained look of long-suffering.

< ... >

< ... >

< Wastelands Resident 13; Sector 4B; Zone 2: Miriam. >

~ mmmmm, ~ The insectoid purred, opening the hard shell of her back just a little to let her wings flutter excitedly for a moment.

~ yes, Wastelands All-Terrain Delivery Droid #C4-BB-G3? ~

< please accept the package transfer. >

Miriam hesitated. Why were the mailbots always in such a hurry? Eventually, she took the package from the android and, with all of her left-hand-side limbs, gestured to her front door. It was actually just a big hole in the ground with a salvaged blast door embedded into it, but quite obviously a proper front door due to the arrangement of twigs carefully stuck to it that vaguely spelled out "W E L C O M E".

~ I have prepared linguine. Do you eat? Do you have mouth parts? Do you want to come inside and eat linguine with your mouth parts with m– ~

Her rapid-fire moans, interjected by the occasional gasp, was cut short when the android, finally relieved of its parcel, abruptly spun around and mounted its rover.

Miriam stood inside the small square of her neat courtyard, which was just fastidiously packed and brushed dirt, and watched it leave. While she stood there, and a more astute observer might have thought that she did so in a very forlorn way, she watched the rover rumble away with some of her eyes, while the rest focused on the parcel in her hands. She quickly and neatly unwrapped the small box with two limbs and lifted two cookies up to her eyes, while another two unfolded the included letter. She was, of course, standing perfectly upright on the remaining two limbs.

A loud, elongated gasp - sounding more like an exclamation of ecstasy - emitted from the vox collar.

~ Mauriiice. My neighbour is alive. And his name is Maurice. And Maurice has invited me to his shack and gifted me these strange, creepy, hard things. ~ She cooed, staring at the objectively horrific cookies which were shaped and decorated to emulate mythologically accurate angels from the Old World.

~ Maurice is a mammal. I have not seen mammals for a very long time. I like mammals. Mammals are cute and have soft warm parts. I would like to touch a mammal again. ~

Miriam's eyes slid upward and scanned the horizon from her doorstep. She remembered the way it looked before the MAD war – before the bombs and smoke and biological mutations. The sunsets were her favourite thing, and one of the things she missed the most, but the Vyx had to admit that since the warheads, the sunsets were absolutely spectacular.

Her wide compound eyes glittered with gold, reds, pinks, and oranges as before, but now as the sun filtered through the depleted ozone layer and blankets of particulates, there were swirls of greens and blues that created a kaleidoscopic effect in the hazy white sky. In the distance, there was a tiny glint that caught the fading light. The line of a perimeter fence. The roof of a shelter. Maurice.

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The next morning at sunrise, there was a flurry of activity inside Miriam's den. It was only identifiable as a plain and nondescript mound of packed dirt at surface level, but below the bleak and desolate topside where it was dark and cool and sometimes still moist, there was a thrum of life – and a whole lot of personality.

~ Ooooooh, you naughty boy, Johnny Hammertime. ~ Miriam moaned softly, bending over.

Johnny Hammertime lifted its head from the parcel box on the floor and looked at her sheepishly. It was a bunny-like creature about the size of a small cat, with six legs, six ears, and six eyes. Miriam dusted the cookie crumbs from its pink nose and picked the creature up with two arms while the others continued to pack her satchel.

~ That was one of the horror treats from Maurice who lives down the hill. He is our neighbour. He is also my new best friend. I am visiting him today for the famous Old World holiday. It is my first time. I am taking the linguine. ~

There was a chilling screech behind Miriam and she turned to look disapprovingly at another creature that was crawling over the low ceiling of her living room.

~ That's not a very nice thing to say, Scarlett. Especially around Johnny. You shouldn't say things like that about mammals. Are you upset that I am taking the linguine to my new best friend Maurice? You don't even eat linguine. You can't because you do not have the necessary mouth parts. ~

Scarlett, a furry spider the size of a large dog, shook itself and dropped to the floor with a dull thud. Then, it plopped itself into its bed and with its one huge, black eye blinking at her sadly and its long proboscis unfurled and lying limply on the floor.

~ You are all behaving very badly today. I will only be gone for twelve hours as I must be back before the sun sets and the sand-slugs start hunting. Also the scorpion-tailed mega titmice are breeding and we cannot make any noise above 40 decibels unless we want to be paralysed and have them lay their eggs inside our bodies. ~

The myriad of creatures that Miriam had rescued and rehabilitated from the surrounding area milled around restlessly while she fastened her satchel closed. They all displayed some form of mutation and boasted names from the various adult films the previous owner of the den had collected. On the walls there was badly executed paintings of them, ugly macrame hanging from any available space, misshapen handmade pottery on little, wonky shelves, and a mass of dried flowers hanging in bunches from the ceiling.

Miriam fidgeted excitedly with the stems of dried daisies that she'd decorated her vox collar with. She might have to wear the thing out of necessity, but that didn't mean it had to look ugly.

~ Alright Johnny Hammertime, Scarlett Box, Butch Longg, Rickhard, Synful Mommy and the rest of you, I'm off now to see my best friend Maurice. Behave yourself and when I come back I want to see this place spotless or I will leave you outside for the winged roller-turtles to find you and turn you into new shells. ~

A tearful goodbye later, mostly by Scarlett, and another check of the navigation device which was set to the provided coordinates, saw Miriam walking down the hill on all six legs. Twelve kilometres might not seem like an objectively long distance, but when the very air is trying to kill you (if the murderous wildlife and deranged Wastelanders don't do so first), then twelve kilometres is a difficult and dangerous trip to make. It was only good fortune that acid rain and narc-fog weren't forecasted for the rest of the week.

Luckily for Miriam, most deadly environmental elements had little to no effect on her. It was a fortunate benefit of the genetic propulsion of her ancestor's most valuable quality – the robustness of the Old World Periplaneta americana. The humble cockroach.

Vyx weren't immune to all dangers, though. Four times during the journey, Miriam had to hurriedly burrow beneath the surface when something larger and actually more terrifying than her appeared. She waited in her impromptu hideout, feeling for vibrations from the surface while feeding creepy angel cookies into her chelicerae and covering herself in crumbs. On her abdomen, she cradled the satchel, which contained the precious, cryogenically cooled linguine.

In the end, it took just over four hours to walk to Maurice's shelter. Upon arrival, she paused at the periphery and waited for the telltale click and whine of the perimeter fencing deactivating after reading the RFID chit that Maurice had helpfully included in the parcel. She was glad for that. Vyx could withstand acid, but would fry like anything else under ten-thousand volts of electricity.

Miriam stood at the front door to Maurice's shelter, whizzing her eyes all over the façade and trembling with nervous excitement – so much so that a few dried daisies dislodged themselves from her vox collar. She quickly re-applied them, combed her antennae, and held the canister of linguine in front of her in a very formal fashion. With one spikey-haired limb she also held up the carcass of a wild horn-billed rabbit which she had caught just thirty minutes prior, which lessened the overall formality somewhat.

The Vyx cleared her throat, which was entirely unnecessary and only done because she saw other species do it in Old World movies, and it came out like a croaky bark through the vox box. She was excited. And nervous. Miriam knocked on the door and waited, huge and hulking, and far too close to the entry. When the door slide open, she thrust her gifts into the arms of the surprised host and launched into a stream of sensual rambling.

~ Oooooh, yes! Maurice! Happy Old World Holiday! I am Miriam. That is my name. It is the name of your neighbour who you wrote a letter to. Which is me. The delivery android gave it to me. It was droid number C4-BB-G3 which is not as attractive as droid number L3-TT-C3 even though they are identical but I can tell the difference and it's definitely true. I walked here from my house and did not die. Can you see that I did not die, Maurice? I am alive. I can see that you are also alive. This is very nice. I thought that you were dead like the last mammal to live in this shelter who died when a scorpion-tailed mega titmouse paralysed him and laid eggs inside him. ~

Miriam fished out the last cookie from her satchel and held it in front of Maurice.

~ Thank you for these delicious, creepy, crunchy things, Maurice. You said these look like Old World angels in your letter which I read immediately and then again forty-seven times. These angels have many eyes. I have many eyes. Am I an angel, Maurice? Can I touch your soft warm parts, Maurice? ~

Miriam fed the cookie into her chelicerae like one would feed a log of wood into a wood chipping machine, and stared at Maurice intensely with all of her eyes.

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