The dead grass crunched beneath my feet as I crept towards the sudden noise that awakened me from a weary sleep. Flashing lights I had never seen the likes of before danced around this dilapidated carcass of a city. Hiding behind the wreckage of a slaughtered automobile, I kept my hand on my pistol, in case of rebels. I did my best to suppress a cough that I had developed while traveling through the Wasteland, but my lungs betrayed me.

“Hello?” sounded an elderly, yet innocent voice. “Whoever you are, do you speak English? Oh, I should have never listened to Martial…” Slipping my weapon back into its holster, I rose from behind my cover and approached the naïve man as he stumbled around confusingly.

“Old man, what exactly are you doing here?” I asked, taking my visor off. I wanted to see his eyes with my own. His face became mixed with a combination of revulsion and bewilderment. With a shaking finger, he pointed to my metallic arm in what seemed to be amazement. I didn’t take too kindly to strangers pointing out my flaws. Grabbing him by what seemed to be a lab coat of some sort, I lifted him off the ground. “What do you make of this arm? Is it an oddity, or your certain death?” With these words, I took out my pistol and blew his brains out, tossing him aside so as not to not get too much blood on my clothing. I began to walk away, when suddenly I saw the same flashing lights that I had observed right before the old man appeared.

“Doctor Flemming, don’t go through the machine,” a silhouette yelled with an electric-blue glow radiating behind it.“We don’t know what…” He completely existed in this world now, but this time, the look of shock was on my face. His features were much younger and softened than the earlier traveler.

“Where are you people coming from?” I asked desperately. I was accustomed to either seeing the Dome 17 maintenance uniform or the rebels’ iron clad armor; neither of which had any resemblance to the type of clothes they wore. The young man saw the deceased person whose life I had terminated just a moment before.

“I’ve got to get you back. I can’t get home without you,” the young man sobbed as he placed his hands on the deceased man’s bloodied lab coat. Shutting the corpse’s eyelids, he began to advance towards me. “You! Did you see who or what killed him?” he asked frantically, eyes filled with rage. Deciding to avoid conflict, I lied to him.

“There were some bandits that ran by and tried to loot him. I did my best to ward them off, but they got him before I could even shoot. Listen, why don’t you come over here and we can talk this through.” He nodded his head as I motioned him towards the shelter of a decayed building.
“I was his assistant, my name’s Martial. We were working on a machine that could fulfill our wildest dreams, allow us access to all the riches in humanity’s existence. It could travel time. But before Doctor Flemming could make the scheduled trip to Ancient Egypt, the device malfunctioned and sent us to this godforsaken place. What the hell happened here, anyway?” he said, pointing to the ruins of the city and the abysmal haze of oppressing shadow.

“War. That’s what happened. I read on your comrade’s I.D. tag that the expiration date for it was 1993. A lot has happened since then that you ought to know about. During the earlier years of the twenty first century, tensions in the Middle East began to rise to the point where bombing raids became a common occurrence. What I believe used to be called, the United Colonies… No, sorry, United States, were constantly interfering with the political structure of the Middle East, and set up colonies where Americans ruled over the Arabian peoples. Eventually, these countries revolted against the ruling forces and made their own secret weapon development program in the country of… what was it? Australia? No. Austria, that’s where it was. They then launched a worldwide nuclear assault, and quite naturally, the whole world got involved. After the nuclear devastation, only Russia remained, ruled by a new group of leaders called the PGI, or the Protective Governmental Institution. They shuffled the last remaining survivors into new utopias, beauties of architecture that ensured safety and protection from any rebels. Of course, we’re not in one right now.”

“Damn,” Martial said after I had finished talking. “This is all pretty heavy, man. Everything I once loved on this Earth, my family, my old neighborhood…Even McDonalds’ are gone!” With a depressed sigh, he sat back down on the ground. After mulling over the situation in his mind for some time, he asked me, “What exactly do you do in all of this chaos?”

“Well I work for the PGI as part of a purging task force, sent to destroy any outside disturbances such as rebels and free thinkers. It’s a tough job, but somebody has to do it. Oh, by the way, that reminds me.” With these words, I pulled out my pistol and shot him right in the chest. I really enjoy kids; they remind me of simpler times.