ALBA
Page 21
You load the syringe with the one dose available and inject it into a vein in your arm. You don’t have much time – it still hurts when you remove the rest of your ear, but it’s nothing compared to the agony you might have been in. You force yourself to stay sharp as you stitch the wound shut. Soon, the bleeding has slowed, and you look at your discarded ear lying on the ground. You put it into your pack; it seems odd to just leave it here to rot.
Lying back against the tree, you close your eyes. You’ll go on to the city. But first the morphine must wear off.
END.
Add Resolve to your character sheet.
Add Ear (O.11) to your inventory.
Remove Morphine from your inventory.
Add The City Centre (Chapter 13, L.13), The Cult (S.2, L.S2), and The Windmill (Chapter 23, L.23) to map.
Remove all unexplored locations north of the river from the map.
11.30
Without a painkiller, this is going to hurt.
You open your first aid kit and lay it on the ground in front of you. Carefully, you prepare your operating scissors and a needle and thread. Then you bite down on a stick from the base of the tree and cut the useless remains of your ear off.
Even with something to muffle you, you scream so loud it hurts your throat. You feel vomit rise, but you choke it back down, desperately trying to fight against the pain. Your hands are bloody and shaking as you pick up the needle and try to stitch the open flesh back together. Each pull of the thread is agony. You don’t know how long it takes, but eventually the bleeding has slowed, if not stopped completely. You fall back against the tree and breathe heavily. Your ear lies discarded to the side. You pocket it – it seems odd to leave it here.
You’ll need time to recover, but when it’s better, you’ll go to the city. What other choice do you have?
END.
Add Instability to your character sheet twice.
Add Ear (O.11) to your inventory.
Add The City Centre (Chapter 13, L.13), The Cult (S.2, L.S2), and The Windmill (Chapter 23, L.23) to map.
Remove all unexplored locations north of the river from the map.
Chapter 12
The Zoo
12.1
The word Zoo is not one you’re particularly familiar with. Like many things from the Old World, it didn’t make the transition into the vaults. Honestly, humans were so focused on saving themselves from a nuclear apocalypse that animals largely fell by the wayside. Before you came to this land, the only animals you’d ever interacted with had been the coop of chickens that the vault kept to use for eggs.
One of the hens pecked you when you were six. You’d mostly kept your distance after that.
And yet, here it is, plain as day, a sign that was once gaudy and bright but is now battered by the annals of time. There was probably more information, once – explanations for the visitors who used to flock here, but now only one word remains.
ZOO.
You step under the stone archway that leads into the place. It’s unlikely your group would be here, but it’s worth a look – if they passed through, then they might have left some sort of clues in their wake, something that could let you know where they’re going. A voice in your head argues that you’re genuinely curious. You want to know about what they did for fun back in the old world.
Plus, you wonder if any animals are still alive.
The place has clearly seen better days. Nobody has bothered with upkeep, so all the plants that were likely once nicely groomed are now overgrown and wild, spilling out of their pots and tumbling onto the ground. Weeds stick out from the cracked paving stones and try to trip you up as they lead you to a large, open square. It’s eerily empty, apart from the remains of a garish pink and yellow pavilion and a collection of rusting pictures and signs on a signpost. Tall trees try to hide the other paths that lead outwards from this place.
Read the signs – Turn to 12.2, Needs Old World Language.
* * *
Investigate the images – Turn to 12.3, Needs Knowledge.
* * *
Look for signs of animals – Turn to 12.4, Needs Survival.
* * *
Wander amongst the trees – Turn to 12.5.
* * *
Go into the pavilion – Turn to 12.18.
12.2
You use the sleeve of your coat to wipe away the dust and dirt that has made its home on these signs. The words, once bright and informative, are now mostly faded, just little scratches that need to be deciphered.
You run your finger along each letter and try to sound the words out like a child does as they learn to read. It takes a while, but eventually you make some headway – you understand the signs are explaining the various areas of this place, detailing the diverse animals that once had their homes here. It seems there were several different species housed in each place, but you aren’t quite sure why.
The best explanation that you can come up with is that these animals were all being kept together here in order to run some sort of research.
Visit ‘carnivores of the world’ – Turn to 12.6.
* * *
Visit ‘the African savannah’ – Turn to 12.7.
* * *
Visit ‘the reptile house’ – Turn to 12.8.
12.3
The pictures are almost as faded as the words, but at least it’s easier to tell what they’re meant to be. Long extinct animals. Elephants, sharks, orangutans – all species that were lost in the great war.
You remember learning about these animals in your studies. The lesson hadn’t focused much on them; there was no point in reminiscing over all the things the war had taken, otherwise the lectures would never end. You remember looking over a few pages of a book at the lists and lists of creatures who used to inhabit the earth before humans destroyed both it and them.
In your heart you hope that maybe some of them survived the fallout, but you know it’s unlikely. If the animals weren’t killed in the blast, it’s likely the radiation got them.
Humanity is awful, is the conclusion you come to. But there’s nothing you can do about it now.
You look around, peering through the trees to the other areas of the zoo. There seem to be some large cages in front of you, and on the way is a dilapidated glass house. To the east it looks like there’s some sort of open field.
Visit the large cages – Turn to 12.6.
* * *
Visit the open enclosure – Turn to 12.7.
* * *
Visit the ruined glass house – Turn to 12.8.
12.4
Though the ground is covered in pavement tiles, there’s enough settled dust for you to be able to search for tracks.
There are no prints, apart from the small, forked feet of birds who have landed and taken off again when they decided there was no food worth having down here. A further exploration shows no droppings, and no marks on trees to indicate that there are nests or dens. It’s likely that the animals kept here either died in the explosions, were taken out by the radiation, or – if they were able to get through that far – starved to death because they were stuck inside cages and everyone whose job it was to look after them had perished.
It’s a shame that so much life was lost in the war, and how easily people can forget about it when it isn’t human.
There are a few places dotted around. To the north, you can see a glass house that’s almost skeletal at this point, cracked and overgrown with vines just like everything else here. Beyond that is a series of complex cages that you guess once held large mammals. To the east is a large, open field.
Add Bird Prints (F.13) to your notebook.
* * *
Visit the large cages – Turn to 12.6.
* * *
Visit the open enclosure – Turn to 12.7.
* * *
Visit the ruined glass house – Turn to 12.8.
12.5
You step past everything else, all the destroyed mess, and into the trees
. It’s nice to see that nature is trying to take back what was stolen from it. You remember Vola turning to you in your youth with a grin on her wrinkled face before departing wisdom in a hoarse voice: “We haven’t killed the planet, my dear, we’ve killed ourselves. It will keep on going, long after we’ve gone.”
It’s sad how right she was, but you can’t help but feel sorry for all the animals caught up in this. They didn’t ask for this fallout. They didn’t ask to be irradiated and starved to death. In fact, they probably had no say about ending up in this zoo in the first place. It breaks your heart.
You step between the overgrown trees on dusty earth that has blades of grass trying to peek through. You feel bad crushing it underfoot when it’s making such an effort to grow. In the distance, you can see the sun glinting off the remains of what appears to be a house of glass; however, if you go left, you will end up in a clearing. Perhaps another area animals were kept?
Go to the glasshouse – Turn to 12.8.
* * *
Go to the opening – Turn to 12.7.
12.6
Lining the sides of a curved promenade are a series of tall, ornate cages. Within them are artificial landscapes, ones you know would have been much different from this country’s normal weather and climate. The faux areas have been moulded from stone and painted in earthy tones.
You can’t imagine that the places were hugely enriching for the animals, even when they were running. You can see weathered signs hanging above each of the enclosures pointing out areas of the Old World where each animal originated. Though next to each other in cages, they were originally thousands of miles apart. It seems unfair to force them to make that journey to a strange, new land that could only be full of terror for them.
Not unlike yourself, you suppose. At least you had a choice in the matter.
You stop at the end of the row. A large pane of broken glass separates you from a synthetic habitat that looks like mountains. A huge skeleton is in the middle of it. You recognise the creature from the sign from a storybook you read in your childhood – it is, or was, a bear. Once mighty and proud, now nothing but ash and bone.
Inspect the skeleton – Turn to 12.9.
* * *
Go to the glasshouse – Turn to 12.8.
* * *
Go to the open enclosure – Turn to 12.7.
12.7
Considering you are in the middle of what was once a great city, this open area is surprisingly vast. Though no match for the open plains where the animals who inhabited this place came from, it at least offers a large field to exercise and explore. Some of it has been sculpted to make it seem more rocky and barren on one side, more natural and overgrown on the other, probably to try to simulate the natural environment as closely as possible.
There’s only a worn-down fence between you and this area. It might be worth exploring further.
Go into the enclosure – Turn to 12.10.
* * *
Go to the glasshouse – Turn to 12.8.
12.8
It’s difficult to pick your way through the broken glass. You’re glad that your boots have such thick soles – a less-prepared traveller may have found their foot sliced open.
Despite being open to the fresh air there’s still a pungent smell lingering around the glasshouse, a stink of stagnant water and rot. It seems this place was home to several smaller enclosures, each of them no bigger than the desks at which you spent your school hours. You peek into the ones that you’re able to and find that they’re built up inside with sticks and leaves. You furrow your brow – how are people meant to watch the animals if they’re hidden in foliage?
The only things moving in here are insects. They seem to have thrived in spite of everything. You watch with vague interest as dozens of beetles writhe and crawl over each other in one of the exhibits. At least something survived all of this, you think.
Inspect the building further – Turn to 12.11.
* * *
Move on – Turn to 12.12.
12.9
Carefully, you remove more of the glass from the pane surrounding the enclosure. It takes a while as you don’t want to slice your fingers, but eventually you make a gap big enough to get through without injuring yourself.
There’s a lingering smell of death when you wander inside. You wonder if the hole in the glass was made before or after the bear died – if it was trapped and starved to death before the enclosure wore down, or if it broke out and lived its life, simply coming back here to go to sleep one last time.
Not worth dwelling on. Too miserable.
It’s difficult to tell how long the animal has been dead for. It’s long since rotted away, layers of fat stripped down to nothing but bone. You drop to your knees in front of it, still amazed by its sheer size, even in death.
You want to take a memento. A whole bone might be too much… but a tooth?
One of the pointed canines comes away easily in your hand from the skull. You turn it over in your hand, surprised by its good quality despite the years that have passed. You tuck it into a pocket before leaving the skeleton alone in its faux cave and resting place.
Add Bear Tooth (O.19) to your inventory.
* * *
Turn to 12.12.
12.10
You lower yourself slowly into the open enclosure, hopping the fence that surrounds it with relative ease. Your boots crunch loudly on the dry grass, each step serving to amplify the fact that you’re here, and you’re making a lot of noise.
At first you almost don’t hear it. A low sound, like one of the motors that run electricity back in the Seed Vault. But then it gets louder and you slowly turn around.
There’s a large cat, standing where you just jumped down. It’s orange and white and striped – and very, very thin. A tiger? You seem to remember them from your childhood books, but you thought them all long dead.
Its yellow eyes stay focused and the two of you stare at each other for a long time. You don’t want to move in case it gives chase, and the tiger isn’t sure what to make of you in turn.
Ready your weapon – Turn to 12.13, Needs Sharpshooter.
* * *
Remain still – Turn to 12.14.
* * *
Grab a stick and fight it off – Turn to 12.15, Needs Survival.
* * *
Run – Turn to 12.16.
12.11
You spend some time sifting through the rest of the tiny enclosures, avoiding insects where you can (though you feel at least one crawl up your sleeve – it takes a lot of flapping to expel it). You don’t find anything else living, but you do find some interesting remains. There’s a snake skin, thin and delicate in your hands, about twelve inches long – shucked off some time ago by its owner and left as a memento for explorers. A couple of ornate shells that are iridescent and shine blues and greens in the sunlight filtering through the wrecked glass.
All very pretty, but nothing particularly valuable.
You spot a movement out of the corner of your eye and whip your head around. From inside the glasshouse you can see over to the open enclosure, and you swear you just saw something move – was it a tree in the breeze? Was it your imagination? Or was it… well, something else? It might be worth investigating.
Follow the movement – Turn to 12.10.
* * *
Move on – Turn to 12.12.
12.12
You exit the zoo with no more information than when you walked in. The only conclusion you can come to is that no humans have been here for a long time – which means your group hasn’t been here, either. Perhaps it was a high hope that they stopped off here, but it’s worth checking every place you can. Even if your people aren’t there, there’s always a chance that you’ll find something interesting to report when you meet back up with them.
Either way, you make a note of the location and consider coming back here later. There might be more history to be unearthed, more to be learned of the old world.
&nbs
p; You survey your surroundings. The zoo is slightly elevated, giving you a good chance to look around. The landscape is vast here, stretching out for miles in each direction, both town and nature alike. In the distance, you see movement – a line of caravans are making their way along the hill and towards the city centre.