I woke up before the others.
My eyes lingered on Angel for a moment. She was sleeping soundly. We had to move frequently for the past few days. It was good to see her sleep so long. Then I shook my head and went out of the main building. The sun was barely above the barricades.
There were other 3 smaller buildings around it. I went toward the closest and smallest one first.
From the outside it was hard to tell what the building was for; it was heavily barricaded with metal sheets. Inside, it had two compartments. The first one was a toilet and shower. It was divided into men's and women's.
The other half was a large empty room. It had some training dummies and a few wooden weapons. It was probably for training.
Then I went toward the largest of the 3. Even from a distance I could tell it was a generator. On a closer look, it was a large biogas generator. It had high-voltage warning signs around it. There was a tank outside to put waste in.
The final building was also barricaded. Its gate was locked. Looking through the tiny opening in the gate, I could see some kind of skeleton, like a museum display.
I then approached the wall. They were concrete, surrounding the entire area. Factories don't normally have walls like these. It was hard to believe they built it in less than 3 years, even with the help of robots.
By the time I went back to the main building, it had been about 2 hours. I was surprised to see Talor and Carl awake already. I normally wake up around 4AM. Most civilians wouldn't be awake so soon.
When Talor saw me he asked, "Done with your morning walk?"
"Yeah."
"You sure wake up early. I could've shown you around, you know."
"I just wanted to take a walk. But, one of the buildings was locked."
Just before Talor could say anything, the ground shook violently.
Talor muttered, "This is bad," as he bolted to the computer room. Carl followed.
I went to the bedroom, where Angel had just woken up. Then I carried her to the computer room.
Some of the feed showed a lion, half the height of the walls.
After putting Angel down, I said, "That is-"
"A super mutant." Talor cut me off, "This is bad. We survived the last few, but this one's intent on breaking the walls." The ground shook again.
I turned around, "There isn't much time. Rebuilding would take too long. We need to take care of it quickly."
"But how?" asked Talor.
"Its eyes. If we can blind it, we can finish it."
"Have you seen its height? How are you going to reach its eyes?"
"My wooden spear."
Carl nodded, "The wall can't handle much more. I'll go with him. With two of us, we'd be less likely to get hurt. You ready the guns; we will need all the support we can get."
"Fine! But don't try anything foolish."
The ground shook again. I was about to bolt, but before I could, Angel tugged on my shirt, looking up at me.
I held her hand, "I'll be back, just wait for me, okay?"
She lowered her head and let go a moment later.
I ran to the armory. I put on kevlar and grabbed my bone swords, spear, and axe.
Just when I was about to bolt out, Carl came in. I handed him one of the swords and said, "Put on kevlar and follow me."
Carl followed.
There were sloped supports along the walls. I used those to jump over the walls, making my way straight for the beast. Carl was only a few minutes behind.
Before the last wall, I drew my sword. I jumped toward the lion's face, hoping to hit its eyes on the way down.
It moved away at the last moment. I only grazed one ear.
Moments later, Carl jumped down. The lion had moved toward the wall, giving Carl a chance to strike. But he missed too, leaving only a mark on its cheek.
Before it could recover from our strikes, a barrage of bullets made it flinch.
That gave me time to switch to my spear.
As I moved in to strike its eyes, the bullets stopped. But before the spear could hit, it swatted the weapon away. The bullets resumed, but it leaped aside and dashed toward Carl.
Carl stepped aside and slashed at one of its feet. The sword tore through its flesh, only stopping at the bone. It flinched, and the turrets locked on it, hitting it cleanly, giving me the opening to finally hit one of its eyes.
Its movements became more frantic. Its tail barely missed Carl, who ducked out of the way. Immediately, the lion turned sharply and kicked back at me while slashing at Carl.
I leaped back. Carl didn't have time to move, so he blocked its paw with his sword. The blade tore through its paw pad, making it flinch before it could hurt him. That gave him time to get away.
The bullets had stopped.