Night -- Room 5
Ev3 stepped down the motel walkway and found the door marked five.
The key stuck halfway into the lock.
She jiggled it once.
Twice.
Then she shoved the door open with her shoulder.
The hinges squealed.
Dust drifted through the room like fog.
Her pistol came up immediately.
She scanned the corners.
Bed.
Lamp.
Closet.
Bathroom door.
No movement.
She let out a slow breath.
“No payment in bullets tonight.”
Ev3 stepped inside and shut the door quickly.
The blinds snapped closed.
She dragged a chair across the floor and wedged it beneath the doorknob.
Value #1 -- Be extra careful.
The room settled into silence.
A single twin bed stood neatly made beneath a layer of dust. The pastel sheets looked surprisingly intact.
The Whitecoats would have approved.
A cracked mirror hung beside the sink.
A yellowed phone rested on the nightstand—waiting for a world that no longer called.
Ev3 switched on her lantern.
Bright light filled the room.
Four batteries left.
Expensive resources.
She exhaled slowly, shoulders loosening for the first time that day.
“This is going to be a good night.”
The faucet handle squeaked when she turned it.
Nothing came out.
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She sighed.
“Haven’t bathed since the Vault. ”
She picked up the motel soap and sniffed it.
The smell hit her instantly.
Clean.
Familiar.
Reminds me of home.
“I miss showers on Tuesdays. ”
The mirror told the rest of the story.
Ev3 leaned closer.
“Ugh.”
Her brown hair was tangled with dust and debris.
Her face was streaked with dirt.
Dark bags rested beneath tired eyes.
She brushed her teeth slowly, lantern light flickering across the mirror.
The woman staring back looked nothing like a vault graduate.
She had never been given a real name.
Her designation code was Ev3-890.
Ev3 had been created for a purpose.
Repopulate the Earth. Destroy the alien invaders.
Those were the only instructions that mattered.
The Whitecoats had drilled hundreds of survival lessons into every release.
They called them the Valuable Apocalypse Lessons & Ulterior Examples Series.
Everyone simply called them:
Values.
Ev3 knew most of them by heart.
She sat on the bed and removed her heavy jacket.
Dust puffed into the air.
She wiped her face with a moist towelette and lit an old-world cigarette.
Smoke curled slowly toward the ceiling.
“Hope I don’t hear any lurkers tonight. ”
Nighttime was the worst part of the wasteland.
She had learned that lesson quickly.
#25. Don’t let them find you asleep.
Ev3 lay down fully clothed.
Her quantum revolver rested on her chest.
She held it like a shield against the darkness.
Sleep never came easily anymore.
Only fragments.
Small pieces of rest between threats.
A sound outside the window made her eyes snap open.
A wet snarl.
Something shuffled past the building.
A Mutoid. Black oily skinned freaks with fangs.
Ev3 froze.
The Vault had drilled this into them.
Silence drills.
Slow your breathing.
Become nothing.
Ten feet from her door the creature paused.
Gurgling.
Sniffing.
Ev3 didn’t move.
Seconds stretched.
Her heartbeat thundered in her ears.
Fifteen minutes. Come on, Leave already
Forty five minutes. Please just go.
Eventually the creature wandered away.
Only then did she let her eyes close again.
Sleep came slowly after that..
But the dreams did not.
History unfolded in broken flashes.
2077 The alien ship arrives.
The countdown begins.
A massive black pyramid descending over New York.
Fog rolling across the city.
Glass lifting from skyscrapers.
Three landing struts extending like the legs of a god.
People screaming
Then the ship descends.
The impact crushing entire blocks of Manhattan.
A horn blasted across the skyline.
BAHROOO.
Fog spilled from the vessel like poison breath.
The world changed.
But the aliens weren’t gods.
They could bleed.
And anything that could bleed—
Could be killed.
