《End of the World Tourist》


 Book 1 Ch 1: Lone Survivor Guilt

    The man who wore his advanced radiation protection suit tried to look at the clouds in the sky. It was covered in tiny flecks of ash; a nuclear war had erupted and the natural environment along with most living creatures was in a state of severe decline.


    In front of him was a major intercity highway that stretched off into the distance, cars and vehicles were abandoned or filled with bodies who had either died by their own hands or by looters before the bombs had finally fallen.


    The few buildings on the side had been turned to rubble or burnt, if the man saw any signs of life, he paid little attention. He took one step forward, heavy rubber boot crunching into the now-cracked asphalt, the sound echoing around.


    Hundreds of thousands had been wiped out in cities and residential regions across the planet. Those living in the countryside had been relatively spared by comparison but would still struggle to survive.


    The few survivors would need to cope with the fallout, nuclear winter, disease, and death.


    Those that the radiation didn¡¯t kill first would struggle to survive the change in the climate and a daily fight over resources such as clean food and water.


    Few, if any animals would struggle to live past the first few weeks and any that did would be changed forever. There would always be an isolated region however where no nuclear bombs had been dropped and life carried on as normal.


    But those places held little interest for the man nor his odd choice of companion, they lacked what he was currently searching for. On his hip a radiation detector was fitted on the outside and knocked against the suit with each movement, the red light ebbed and glowed as he navigated his way through


    ¡®Just one more step forward. Towards a light, no, a flickering hope of civilisation. I owe the dead scientists I left behind me in to survive and pass on the knowledge of my suit. That and those who I still owe footage.¡¯ said the figure.


    Wearing a heavy fitting radioactive suit would normally have reduced the senses and overall awareness of surroundings of an individual.


    Inside the outfit was a hearing booster which enabled the man to hear for several kilometres in each direction. The man had chosen to deaden his own senses to avoid being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of death.


    That and he had wanted to truly experience the life of an average human who had truly experienced a world-changing disaster. The nuclear apocalypse had arrived and it would change the face of the planet.


    The physical forms of animals and plant life would need to rapidly evolve change to adapt to the new world that had been created due to the violent actions of the human on this planet. The man in the suit kept walking one foot in front of the other, his heavily shielded boot crashing into the broken road that was in his path.


    Aside from looking upwards occasionally his face under the mask was full of sheer determination to finish his job, his duty called him, that, and fear of his failing the lessons that his mentor had beat into him.


    For right now though he just needed to keep walking, one foot in front of the other down the partially broken remains of the major inter-city Highway through the dust storms and debris clouds.


    The enhanced senses of the man picked up survivors in the surrounding buildings and the highway beyond him. He could simply ignore the cries and moans they made as they felt their bodies and minds falling apart due to radiation sickness. Or they¡¯d simply were dying from injury caused by the looting and falling apart of society.


    The riots and civil unrest would set in soon once the initial shock wore off. The man could feel the radiation contamination radiating off people and groups in the buildings to the sides of the highway, he could hear their whimpers and skin and hair fell out as their organs began to shut down.


    Horus turned to his companion thinking for a moment and set his mind firm. He¡¯d had enough of it, just this once he¡¯d take a chance and be kind. The agency would check for the action but this was right here, right now.


    ¡®Casey. Kill them, I don¡¯t care about the rules. Just turn them all off as peacefully as possible. Nobody deserves to live like that. I can¡¯t stand the suffering. Just do it in a two-kilometre radius. Only those in terminal condition though. The ones who aren¡¯t going to recover. Please. I think most around here are already dead judging from the smell.¡¯


    His companion perhaps sensing his mood didn¡¯t talk aloud but there was a minor shift in reality as hundreds instantly died. The man stood on the highway surrounded by vehicles which has been either abandoned or let his head fall forward for a moment of pure silence out of respect.


    ¡®I can¡¯t help anyone. Not really. My mentor did. She broke the rules and look what happened to her. Exiled and forgotten despite producing some of the best tourism materials ever seen. Screw it. Let¡¯s carry on with it. Back to the script. Let¡¯s find us some government types.¡¯


    The hardest part of the job for the man on occasion was the ability to distance yourself from the specific reality and get with footage. He looked forwards to the distance and decided to continue for now. He decided to reduce his own senses even further down towards a standard human living on this planet. If it was essential, he¡¯d boost them back up to optimal levels but for now he needed a moment of peace. He needed to focus and get the job done at all costs without the distractions.


    After he had reduced his sensory awareness a large roadside sign with bright yellow letters broke off due to a sudden blast of high winds from the side of the highway and almost smashed into his body as he turned and narrowly avoided it. The sudden movement failed to stop the man stepping forward, but he did stop for a moment to watch where it had landed.


    ¡®Huh. A military warning sign. Not worth a shot though. Too generic for my tastes.¡¯


    Stopping for a moment on his trek he looked back behind him and through his filtration mask he saw the words [In the Event of an Enemy Attack this Highway will be Closed to Civilian Traffic].


    Horus watched as the sign got picked up by another gust of wind and flew off into the distance, forever forgotten. A stark reminder to the man that this world had been prepared in advance, but you never fully could, not in this situation. The further breaking sounds of the sign as it continued its passage along the highway faded behind the man as he stood there.


    ¡®Pretty close call there. I almost got my suit damaged. One broken seal on this and all the nasty stuff outside gets in. This area is desolate, guess they didn¡¯t get to escape the blasts.¡¯


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    The Highway was strewn with the remains of broken or damaged vehicles with bodies inside that had either been cooked alive through the heat of nuclear fire or died from the radiation soon afterwards. The man never stopped to look inside the vehicles, his desire was for the living not the dead or dying. His rubber booted feet continued to make gradual progress.


    ¡®Dead, all dead but I need to keep going. For hope of a better future.¡¯


    The words of the man could barely be heard above the sound of the wind and from inside the filtration mask of the radioactive proactive suit he was wearing.


    If he stretched his hearing, he could hear the sound of fires ranging out of control in settlements far away from the road. There could even be survivors there, but he wouldn¡¯t be able to help them. Charity, first-aid, and resources weren¡¯t something he was prepared to offer random strangers. He had his orders, and he was going to fulfil them. To keep his mind focused and clear he thought about what had led the planet to its current state.


    ¡®It¡¯s the same every single time. Madness and paranoia combined with weaponry gone out of control. Similar but different.¡¯


    Horus knew what had happened to this planet. A war out of control had used devices that once unleashed were unable to be stopped. Weapons of mass destruction had been used to great effect and little cheer. Once the bombs had been dropped it was too late to take in the great consequences that followed, the moral and ethical implications ignored as military force had swept across the lands without regard for the lives of those who once lived in this country. He had flown above and seen little more than ruins, destroyed cities, and struggling groups trying to cope with the shock and the primal need for food, shelter, and protection.


    War caused devastation, death, and chaos. The man sighed deeply and continued his search, his mission. Heavily covered feet in the suit kicked up dust from the ground that could have been the remains of a public highway. He was a man on a mission, to find those who still lived. His journalistic instincts and intuition drove him onwards, occasionally taking the time to look at the sky when any patches of blue appeared and vanished.


    The clouds were near impossible as the sun to visit, impenetrable beneath the layers of ash that had been pumped into the atmosphere. Some would still yet live the man silently pondered how many would survive the coming days. Those that did or were secreted away in shelters would be his targets, he needed footage and good stuff too. This was a job that needed paying and it wasn¡¯t as though the wind and radioactive filled ruins would offer anything.


    A flying piece of debris hit the ground in front of the man causing a hard sudden noise. A hard bang failed to elicit any reaction in spite of the mild surprise he had felt.


    ¡®Nope.¡¯


    The man paused for a moment just to make sure that it wasn¡¯t gunfire or an attack before looking to the sky for any other pieces that had been swept up in the winds.


    ¡®Just the wind. Not an attack.¡¯


    Water, electricity, fuel, and food would all be running out for those unlucky enough to be caught outside. He was one of the lucky ones, he had been far enough away from the nuclear attacks inside his bunker along with his fellow scientists with enough resources to have lasted for decades. His purpose though was to find others like him.


    There would be survivors, of that he was certain. Humans were resilient beings even able to survive in the world of circumstances. Born to survive. Eventually, he would make his way across the barren, blasted wasteland and end up meeting some of them.


    They might even be willing to be interviewed if they weren¡¯t complete assholes whose brains had rotted from drinking contaminated water and their asses glowed in the dark. It had made it far easier for him to spot them from a distance when the sun went down, and the crazies had come out. Green behinds showing their distinct locations made it easier for him to avoid them until they had run after him and kept chasing him. They were mostly annoying and complete non-conversationalists aside from the handful of words that they remembered.


    All he got from them were one or two-syllable words at best, boring to say the least. They could have at least gone without all the screaming and had some kind of consideration for his hearing. He wasn¡¯t affected by it, but he would have appreciated some form of politeness. They smelt bad, looked worse and made a whole lot of noise.


    In front of him there had been a violent crash where one car had smashed directly into the side of the other. He thought that he could see a pair of legs sticking out of the side of one of the vehicle. This major city-highway was full of wrecks, and it made his travel slow, but it was considered a safer path. He put a gloved rubber suited hand out and pushed against the combined wreck, a high-pitched screeching noise as sparks flew on the ground and a hint of smoke as rubber tires were forced to move.


    The man didn¡¯t shove it over the edge of the major Highway through the metal barriers on the sides. The heavy clanging noise that it would make could echo throughout the area and attract unwanted attention.


    ¡®I¡¯m tempted to melt these wrecks down, but it¡¯d ruin my boots. Stay in character, I am a superhuman scientist. No, a pacifistic scientist. No conflict.¡¯


    The ones with more intellectual thoughts were even more terrible to deal with for humans. He wasn¡¯t a fan of those types of survivors, the ones that talked about him like he was a piece of fresh meat for them to eat. There he was minding his own business looking for a slice of human interest and they would turn up and talk about him like he was an animal to be roasted on a fire and dragged behind them to tenderise. It made him almost prefer the screaming glowing green eyed crazies by comparison. They didn¡¯t try to hide their nature behind fancy words and attitudes.


    Hopefully, this world would be better than the last radiation-blasted planet that he¡¯d visited. Everyone there was heavily into cannibalism, not undead brainless zombies because that was a different type of post-apocalypse category, but the radiation had made them have a taste for uncontaminated fresh meats. Too bad their teeth shattered when they tried to bite his fingers off, the man was made of far stronger stuff than dentine.


    ¡®I¡¯m nobody¡¯s appetiser. Ever.¡¯ The man muttered to himself.


    He¡¯d had to write off the planet as mildly interesting but far too familiar after you¡¯ve experienced one horde of cannibal humans who¡¯d lost their minds due to radiation exposure and become a creature that was both more and less than your standard homo sapiens it got boring quickly. Stronger, faster but dumber. He did have a fair but of fun experimenting with different body parts for them to try and bite though, the sound of their cracking teeth made the man smile under his radiation protection suit when he recalled the memory. They didn¡¯t succeed of course given the inherent strength of his body, but it had been pretty entertaining to record. The one key highlight of his planetary tour at the time.


    They had smelt pretty nasty though when they got too close, like rotting blue melon juice left out on the surface of the sun. In other words, super bad and he wasn¡¯t a particular fussy man usually.


    Their hair and skin have been just as bad as well, with no sense of personal care. All messed up, overgrown locks and glowing faintly greenish-yellow skin. He did not want to remember how their toenails looked.


    No. Just no. Their eyes melting in their sockets reminded him of ice cream gone bad in the sun.


    Super bad hygiene habits as well. He understood that living in a nuclear wasteland meant that having a shower and access to clean water was hard, but they could always dry wash or just cut their hair. Yeah, that planet had not been out of his personal choice but just one of a massive selection that he had to try and make work.


    He had given it a solid three out of ten when he¡¯d given his professional review. Too many crazy cannibals and not enough diversity for his tastes. If they¡¯d remembered how to cook and a bunch of them had become chefs of long pig then he would have bumped them up a point or two.


    A place to check off the list. Horus had put it down as an inadvisable location, two to three stars at best. It likely meant the erasure of the planetary reality if nobody marked it up, but he¡¯d been annoyed that day. Not every place got a five-star review. Zero stars would mean near instantaneous erasure. Horus had heard rumours at the main tourist hub but never saw actual confirmation in person.

 Book 1 Ch 2: Prototype Suit

    This time it would be different, he was on the lookout for a very special type of survivor. The ones who had gotten to the underground bunkers or been stationed there when the bombs flew, and the earth cracked apart with the fury of a dozen suns.


    They¡¯d be the ones with still working showers given that the limited nuclear exchanges had been over in several hours, he was hoping that they¡¯d still have hairdressers as well.


    They seemed to survive most apocalypses as in his personal opinion, they surely had the gods of styled hair watching over them. He didn¡¯t know if fashion designers were the same but surely, they had a similar level of protection given how people liked to dress up in other places he had visited.


    His bright yellow radiation suit made him stand out in the now dust-ridden fields surrounded by dead animals and broken-apart buildings. The dust clouds hadn¡¯t had time to settle yet as the nuclear exchange had only ended a few hours previously.


    The suit was fully equipped with a filtration backpack, full chemical, and biological reinforcement seals, built-in boots, and gloves along with a built-in respirator with a mask that was self-sealing.


    ¡®Did a brilliant job with the attention to detail on this suit Casey. I¡¯m still trying to stick to the script so no need to respond just yet.¡¯ said Horus.


    Any tears would be instantly closed, and the self-repairing function was extremely slow but would eventually work. There was no need to change the respirator filters as it was meant to be large for fifty years on the outside.


    Casey had done a great job in building it and the man had lent a hand with part of the design to make sure that it didn¡¯t come across as over-engineered.


    The technology needed to be advanced enough to be desirable but at the same time realistic enough to be possible.


    If Horus was walking around in a pair of shorts, a t-shirt and flip-flops he might get some seriously annoying questions. There was no way he was going to deal with those until he¡¯d gotten his interviews out of the way.


    The protection suit in short was seriously expensive by local standards and not readily available to around ninety-five per cent of the population.


    Highly advanced technology like it was usually only available to extreme elites at least in this reality. They might have better equipment lying around the country in forgotten research facilities, but he doubted it unless a bunch of aliens had decided to visit, and they¡¯d managed to reverse-engineer their technology.


    For the sake of the spirits, the locals had used planes to drop nuclear bombs rather than missiles so while their research and development were pretty good there were still some significant gaps. Rockets required a far higher level of engineering and resources which was only possible either through resident geniuses or when society had reached a certain standard of living.


    He recalled reading that before the war started all three sides had been focusing on more defensive measures after all until the accident with the coffee machine and the General having a bad day with his pet rabbit biting him. The man had read the incident reports himself; it¡¯d made for light reading before he had started his little trek.


    ¡®Pretty standard stuff. Military, blah blah. Countries trapped in a five-hundred-year war. Situation out of control, someone pressed a button and then nuclear bomb runs. A few hundred thousand intially dead.¡¯ muttered Horus.


    All of the documents had been classified as eyes only with a security clearance, but he¡¯d managed to get around that with the help of his friend, it hadn¡¯t been that hard to find the records on file even when they¡¯d been made of a paper-based substance.


    The planet had already been scanned so grabbing a bit extra had been a small deal on the whole and it hadn¡¯t made any difference to the war. People had been too busy panicking and trying to escape the cites to pay any attention to a bunch of secure files vanishing into thin air.


    An ambulance was in his way and the man saw that it had flipped over with the remains of medical supplies strewn outside. He ignored the breaking sound of glass that he heard when he walked over them. A few blood packs exploded beneath his heavy rubber boots but failed to touch the surface of the man as though it had avoided him deliberately and instead spread around him and fell in droplet to the charred asphalt.


    The true capabilities of the man would have made most people pause if they had realised it. Even the ABC protection suit the man was wearing would have cost tens of millions at least in the local currency of the planet but it wasn¡¯t the unusual thing that would have made any normal person stop and pause to take it in. He made for a far more unusual sight than that.


    Not that anyone was around or alive to watch him walk. Nor was it the fact that he was happily walking across the wastes of a ruined planet while stopping to take photos from his bright orange camera that hung around his neck that wasn¡¯t even the next strange thing about him.


    No, he could have been assumed to have gone mad and simply let the comfort and safety of a private fallout shelter in exchange for one last glimpse of a world passed by before he slowly died of starvation, radiation sickness and thirst.


    A lone madman in a world gone insane through out-of-control weapon usage who wanted to experience a few days of beauty and observation before their body collapsed out of sheer exhaustion. It would have made a great story if anyone was still alive around to record it and turn it into a piece of fiction.


    It was the one accompanying him that made for the strangest possible sight.


    ¡®I am a lone survivor scientist. Need to stay in character. I¡¯m trying my best here Casey and you¡¯d better not be recording this. You hear me? Do not record my paltry acting skills.¡¯ said Horus.


    No companion was walking alongside him, nor was he part of a heavily armed radiation-proofed military convoy or a makeshift caravan driving a protective tank that was fully enclosed. It was the fact that alongside the man was a piece of floating and shiny-new luggage. A single item that would have made anyone look twice if they had seen in and been able to walk in the radioactive hellscape. If their eyes didn¡¯t melt in their sockets from the extreme temperatures that fluctuated wildly or were hit by the traces of constantly falling debris in the sky.


    ¡®Casey?¡¯ queried Horus.


    [I¡¯m here Sir. Just running through a few boring surface scans. Nothing to disturb you yet.]


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    The man carried on walking but nodded his head in response. He was trying his best to navigate the press of vehicles on the Highway, occasionally clambering over them to keep moving forward. He was thankful that his companion was with him although the sight of it may have made survivors consider that they had their lost their minds.


    It was a single piece of luggage. A suitcase that accompanied him. It was unusual in that it was hovering approximately fifty centimetres above the ground. No dust not dirt seemed to settle on a particular item of luggage, and it remained entirely pristine. The fact that it openly talked would have made any survivor doubt their hearing or consider it a device created by advanced science.


    ¡®I¡¯ll need that camera now Casey.¡¯ said Horus.


    [Yes Master Horus, please take it when ready. Please be aware of the presence of any thieves.]


    Reaching out a hand the man opened the suitcase as it floated in the area and after a moment, he pulled the possession that he needed the most after a global nuclear exchange.


    His quantum camera, in theory, was able to take unlimited photos and video footage and then be uploaded straight into the suitcase for immediate recall and editing. At least that was the story that he¡¯d prepared in advance for any curious enough to question him.


    In reality it was like the rest of his clothing, a bare prop without function which worked in this reality simply because he wanted it to do so.


    ¡®Seriously? They¡¯re going to be scavenging through ruins right now, not walking across a major Highway. I do look pretty rich in this suit but still. Back to work for now. I need to get back into character. Wait, do I need to be carrying supplies with me? I could be dragging along or driving a vehicle with the word supplied printed on the side. Maybe even have a bit of popular music playing. Like an ice cream van of the apocalypse except I don¡¯t sell anything. Need a decent tune though...¡¯ said Horus.


    He recalled a song that he¡¯d picked up on the trails remaining of airwaves in this place. The song sang about not wanting to set the world aflame although they¡¯d done a decent enough job of that already. He¡¯d seen global firestorms before and this wasn¡¯t a bad start, although the ash and dust usually covered any outbreaks of fire before it could get started.


    [Sir Horus, I do not believe a vehicle would be a realistic option unless you classified yourself as military personnel carrying supplies. Driving an ice cream truck without damage could cause cognitive damage towards the local population and instil either myth or rumours which would spread and then affect the natural cultural environment.] said Casey as the suitcase flew up into a higher position a kilometre upwards and stationed itself in the dust clouds above.


    ¡®I know...the Tourism Board would wreck me if I cause too much accidental damage to the mind in the world of this place. The planet is small enough and the population isn¡¯t too high. I¡¯ll stick to the suit for now, it can be explained away easily enough. Not that I planned to let anyone take a close look at it. The technology isn¡¯t too far beyond is it?¡¯ asked Horus.


    Despite the position of the suitcase high up in the radioactive dust clouds with occasional extreme winds Horus heard the voice of his best friend and closest ally as though it was perched on his shoulder.


    [I would advise Sir to continue the minimal approach. Despite the relatively small population density of this place


    Horus couldn¡¯t care about all the radioactive dust in the atmosphere as it wouldn¡¯t damage his modified body but he did like to dress for the part when he visited a new world ravaged by the apocalypse.


    This time was relatively simple and once he¡¯d seen the design, he had just asked Casey to make one that would be considered cutting edge on the technology level of this planet. Perhaps far too advanced as he doubted that they had the abilities to produce an ABC suit as good as his, well to be fair he had a CBRN suit really, but if the civilisation had exited for another thirty or so years then they would have been able to produce it.


    </a> Give or take a dozen years added on but he¡¯d neglected including too much technology in the suit, yes it was self-sealing and rather than using rubber-coated materials he¡¯d opted for reinforced nylon with the charcoal-lined interior but it was lacking any fancy gadgets or weaponry.


    Not as though he¡¯d added in lasers or a jetpack to fly around in so if anyone saw him, he could just claim it as one of the few prototypes in existence that came from a long-forgotten hidden development department deep underground which had luckily survived the nuclear holocaust. A lone survivor who was alive to bring hope, that was how the man wanted his presence to be felt when he met others.


    He liked to make sure that he didn¡¯t overshadow people and didn¡¯t want to overstep his technological boundaries. The tourism board smiled on trying to preserve the original state of ruined worlds much as possible without introducing advanced outside variables such as technology ahead of time.


    Horus had planned far ahead for his story on this job and Casey had been kind enough to work out a reasonable script for him to follow. He had a whole backstory and everything to get into the role. His team had been trapped in the development department when war broke out where they had worked there to utilise their diminishing resources to build the prototype suit which would give extreme protection from radiation.


    In the script provided he¡¯d been the one to draw the longest straw so had earned the right to use the advanced spec protective suit. But as soon as he¡¯d left the safety of the small deep underground facility to explore the wastes and report back there¡¯d been an explosion and a final radio signal from those few scientists left behind who wished him good luck and had decided to end their lives and destroy their existing research than carry on any further.


    Their loss had saddened him but filled him with a mission that he would see through for their sakes, to find other survivors and helped them build new versions of his suit which would help them to survive and eventually repopulate a nuclear-blasted world. Yeah, it sounded a bit rubbish to him still but he''d try his best to follow it. He just had to try and get the mannerisms of a pacifist scientist right, to get deeper into the character that he was trying to portray. Ideally, better conversations would be had if he could accomplish that.


    He''d planned a little bit further with his supposed role in this world when he¡¯d finally meet some decent survivors who could carry on an actual conversation rather than dying in front of his eyes.


    He was callous enough already to be considerate and ignore them but it wasn¡¯t as though he was here to rescue people and lead them to safe havens. He had a job to do so as according to his cover story was going to be an intelligent scientist who used one of the only prototypes to undergo a secret mission given by the leader of the country before the bombs dropped. He needed to fulfil it on behalf of his dead comrades who had sacrificed their chance at life for him.


    He had an entire reason for lacking any arms as he was a pacifist scientist. No guns, no knives, or grenades. Survival was down to careful movements and keeping an eye out for potential threats. The fact that there was nothing on this planet that was liable to hurt him was beside the point.


    His lack of weaponry would lead to that as his supplies, but he could always just ask Casey to fly over, and he¡¯d reach in and pull-out whatever materials he needed that were on the level of technology of this world but with a slight upgrade.


    If at all possible, he¡¯d certainly prefer not to because as a freelancer he certainly wasn¡¯t going to be paid for additional expenses even if the cost of products would be minuscule compared to his actual payment for completing the job.


    He was on a timer here and didn¡¯t care much for wasting his time getting into fights with military units or individuals with weapons gone mad or out looking for an enemy to fight. His advanced ABC suit wasn¡¯t built for combat situations, it wasn¡¯t part of his script.


    If he had wanted to become a death-dealing machine then he would have gone to one of the robot uprising realities instead. All the surviving humans in those places knew how to fight before they could even walk.


    That or they all died.


    Besides, they got average reality views at best. This minor planet gave Horus a chance at least. The smaller ones usually did.

 Book 1 Ch 3: Chase the Bomb

    His current radioactive protective suit certainly wasn¡¯t bulletproof though which would lead to some issues if he was shot at mainly because he wasn¡¯t going to keep asking Casey to make costume repairs for an outfit that was built to impress the locals and possibility act as a sort of trading item once he¡¯d found a nuclear bunker or secure facility to enter.


    Dress to impress. He thought to himself. He¡¯d do that often unless he was accompanied by his friend stroke servant Casey. In this case, he simply voiced his inner thoughts aloud as much as possible and then ended up never thinking to himself. On any job, it was far better to have a companion to talk to so the audio quality of your videos didn¡¯t drop too much, you didn¡¯t want people to listen to you talk in a monotonous voice after all when they were trying to create tourism marketing material for another dead or dying world after all.


    Being a freelancer was hard work on the whole without having too many thoughts. In part, his luggage was designed to keep him emotionally and mentally stable and make sure he didn¡¯t lose his temper and do his job the wrong way as he had done when chased by crazed cannibal glowing assholes who wanted him for breakfast. They¡¯d been wiped out in minutes and the bad smell had taken a dozen more to wipe away. The luggage had done a good job as a personal cleaner that day without a single complaint.


    It may not matter for most professional post-apocalyptic tour guides but for the man, he always wanted to get a better feel and know the planet that had been recently destroyed. By making sure that he was dressed he felt as though he could almost be an inhabitant there and it made interviewing with the locals easier as well.


    People freaked out when you looked out of place and if he was caught wandering around here without a protective radiation suit, filters, and emergency supplies than any locals might just decide to run or assume he was an alien. Or it a hallucination, he¡¯d been mistaken for that a few dozen times now when he¡¯d lost patience and walked across boiling lakes of lava naked except for a pair of bright red boots. In this situation, he was going to do his best to be a scientist with a radioactive protective suit and a mission. To have the role in his heart and act out to the best of his ability.


    His mentor had always stressed to him the importance of acting as a tour guide being when you wanted information and you were going to sell the package to others then you had to get yourself into a role. This time he was going for the lone radioactive survivor who just happened to have experimental treatment for an enhanced form who fought radioactive lifeforms and just happened to have become a superhuman in the process. Wait, no, he was meant to be a pacifist scientist. He was getting bored already, it wasn¡¯t a good sign in the mind of the man. Whatever scientist with superhuman powers was the same as one who was on a mission for the last of his crew. He didn¡¯t think anyone would mind too much as long as he talked about science jargon and made up some secret mission from the last leader of the country before war broke out.


    Or it was total bullshit and he¡¯d had to start over with something else. Despite his mentor stressing acting to him, Horus was still pretty crap at pretending to be anything other than what he was. His acting abilities were worthless due to his fairly short attention to detail when it came to roleplay scenarios. Horus was a man who was entirely honest with himself and he knew exactly what he was and who he was at all times. Self-delusion for him was happily not in the cards.


    Horus was a currently freelance post-apocalyptic tour-guide operator who scouted out decent locations and sold them on to large tour guide companies in exchange for a small cut of the profits. He also got to travel to various dimensions and destinations for free but lacked the steady salary and additional benefits that a company employee would have had. Freedom with a taste of spice his old mentor used to describe him when she wasn¡¯t trying to beat rules and patterns of behaviour into his poor bruised head. He¡¯d never been a good listener either.


    ¡®Casey?¡¯


    The suitcase hovering above the ground had been keeping pace with the steps of the man, occasionally navigating its way past any obstacles in its path. Any debris that fell from the sky mysteriously avoided the both of them by at least several metres each time crashing onto the broken road surface or cracked rocky soil instead. Floating towards him it turned in his direction and spoke politely, the surface of its case lightly shimmered in the radioactive haze. Dust clouds rose with each step the man made on his journey along the broken highway, cars lying around with corpses barely rotted due to the amount of radiation they had absorbed.


    A massive shadow appeared around the both of them as a noise was heard in the air, far, far above. It was Casey who heard the sound first, his awareness reaching into the atmosphere as he paid attention their immediate surroundings at all times. Horus feeling his connection with the sentient suitcase felt a sense of wariness hitting him. He turned his gaze towards the darkened radioactive clouds and saw a huge shape within that was moving rapidly similar to a shark swimming in an ocean.


    He began at a light jog before his body shifted into a faster pace and he had run across the width of the broken apart Highway into a patch of wilderness. The radioactive protection suit billowed around him slightly as his rubber boots hit the floor and left indentations.


    ¡®There, can you hear it clearer Casey?¡¯


    [Sir? Yes, judging from the sound and my immediate scan upon detection twenty minutes ago it is a long-range strategic heavy nuclear strike bomber. Damaged and low on fuel. Crew: Five injured. Two dead.]


    ¡®¡­And you didn¡¯t think to tell me about it?¡¯


    [I do believe Master Horus that you are more of a man who likes to experience rather than have a surprise ruined. Besides, it can always be placed inside a temporary time loop for the convenience of the Tourism Board. Ah, the pilot has died, and I do believe that the air crew will attempt to land it safely or reach their original point of departure. Would you care to follow Sir? It will soon appear in average visual range in 5¡­.4¡­3¡­.]


    Horus heard the noise first before he saw the movement in the radioactive dust clouds far above his head. It was a military type of plane, a massive one covered in damaged marks with smoke coming out and a screaming noise as the engines failed to keep it aloft. He recognised it as one of the bombers that had been used in the conflict that had destroyed this world, Casey have been correct. The type that this world would have used to drop their nuclear weapons other countries.


    ¡®You know me well enough Casey. A surprise is as welcome as a bowl of fresh soup noodles.¡¯


    The massive bomber veered in the sky for a moment before he saw a flash of light and smoke billowing out of one of the back engines. Horus saw that the direction it was heading in was further down the badly broken Highway, the momentum of the giant bomber decreased as another engine blew out and more smoke poured into the ash-filled sky.


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    ¡®Casey, follow me. We¡¯ve got an interview to make. You think it¡¯s still holding nuclear munitons?¡¯


    [I will follow along promptly Sir. I thought you said you didn¡¯t want spoilers?]


    The man shook his head, then stretched out his arms and gave his legs a little shake. The yellow radiation suit crackled slightly from his movements.


    Horus began to run forwards and jumped over abandoned cars and vehicles and paths of debris in his way. His rate of acceleration rapidly increased. It would be brilliant opportunity if he was able to interview any survivors. Even if they had all died he could always ask Casey to throw out a quick reverse time loop. It didn¡¯t matter to him if he dragged them back from their afterlife, only if the were going to be worth his time.


    Horus ignored the sound of dead bodies and irradiated windows of vehicles shattering beneath his feet as he kept his gaze fixed on the bomber which was now slowly drifting down over the edge of the horizon. The crunch of bone and flesh alike followed his swift movements.


    Shifting his body into a crouched position Horus bent down, rubber boots crunching into t the asphalt and leapt fifty metres into the air and landed on the top of a van crunching it beneath his feet. Tensing himself he launched his body even higher in the air before landing in a sliding tackle which knocked a nearby passenger car screeching across the Highway and through the metal railings on the side where it flew smashing to the ground.


    ¡®I¡¯m not going to make it with all this junk in the way. Casey?¡¯


    [Yes Sir, how might I assist you?]


    ¡®I need a localised gravity lift in this vicinity. Just enough to let me build some speed to get back this traffic jam. I¡¯m not going to keep trying superhero jumps. A wide time reset is a hard no, but we can get away with temporarily breaking the rules of physics for a few seconds.¡¯


    [Master Horus, are you quite certain? Alteration will be a minor breach of rule 9.16 paragraph four, sentence fifteen.]


    ¡®Just lift the vehicles up for eight seconds Casey. No, give me four seconds. This highway is boring enough and a little bit more mess won¡¯t make a difference. Everyone who would have seen us is dead remember?¡¯


    [As you wish Sir. Localised gravity lift will activate in 5...4..3..2..]


    Horus got into a race posture with his radioactive suit gloves touched the ground as he felt a shift in the air with his senses as though a god was waving their hand. Even before Casey had enabled the effect he sprinted as fast as he could, air resistance heating up the suit. He felt the heat increase surrounding him and slowed himself slightly as he ran forward to a now clear section of highway. Vehicles, empty suitcases, clothing, and debris and more than a few dead bodies rose several meters into the air above the Highway.


    If anyone had been watching they wouldn¡¯t have understood exactly why the rules of physics on this massive stretch of road for several hundred metres had been broken. The best opinion from any educated scientists would have been that the fabric of reality would have been thinned from the nuclear radiation released from the bombs. None in their right minds would have considered it to be the action of a single floating suitcase.


    As quick as the effect had taken place it soon passed and local laws of gravity kicked back in as metric tons of metal, rock and flesh came smashing down into an already damaged stretch of Highway. Horus had sure to limit the effects of the heat and speed on his suit to prevent it from being overly damaged. Casey had made efforts to make it suitable for his currently superhuman frame while trying to keep in with the aesthetics of the current technology level of this planetary reality.


    The eyes of Horus beneath the filtration mask were fixed on the sight of the massive bomber as it dipped lower in the sky above the horizon. He pondered for a moment if there was in fact a military or aircraft base further ahead. Now that he¡¯d cleared a large section of the Highway, he could see a vague dirt path in the distance where the asphalt ended as various connecting junctions connected.


    ¡®Casey. Is there a military presence that you¡¯re not telling me about again? I remember that sign I saw a while back. The one that said that civilian traffic would be banned. It makes me think how many of the bodies in the car died of bullet holes rather than shockwaves or radiation.¡¯


    [Master Horus. The Tourist Agency pays for eyes on the ground rather than a terrestrial scan. If you were a visitor, would you prefer spoilers?]


    ¡®No. Still, it makes me wonder. I¡¯m going to carry on walking for a while. That nuclear bomber seemed to be heading straight forwards. It makes me think what we can find at the end of the road.]


    [An ending Sir.]


    Shaking his head Horus just carried on walking. This


    ¡®Casey? You still around?¡¯


    [Yes Sir. How may I be of assistance to you on this fine summer afternoon?]


    The man in the radioactive protection suit looked up at the sky again before he realised that nuclear war did have a slight tendency to mess up weather patterns and also planetary seasons. He couldn¡¯t see the sun, he might have enjoyed to stare at it for a while to see who blinked first. It was unlikely that this one was sentient though. The strong winds blew past him, but he ignored the dust that blew into his suit along with minor debris.


    ''I¡¯ll accept your word on that one Casey. And yes, I do realise with my enhanced senses I could work out the time and exact date on my own. I just have a load on my mind right now. You know how it is. Gotta keep to schedule; freelancers need to make money when they can-¡®


    [Where they can. Yes, Sir, you¡¯ve repeated that phrase exactly 340 times since we¡¯ve landed on the planet. If I may Sir, you appear displeased. Would you care to share? I am, as always, here to listen.]


    ¡®I know you are. Let me walk a bit more though, really get a decent feel for this reality.¡¯


    Horus continued walking, he let one hand trail on the remnants of abandoned vehicles and tried his best to avert his gaze when he saw human remains within them. He knew that he should do his best to ignore it but not being native born he lacked the same distinction between realities.

 Book 1 Ch 4: Roleplaying Failure

    A heavily accented upper-class voice came from the handle of the luggage that floated through the air. Despite the fact it had no discernible mouth or speaker outlet, the sound seemed to echo from all around the immediate vicinity. It had a voice of servitude mixed with a tone of boredom.


    This story was one of many that it had heard previously when its master was bored. It hoped that this time he would find an event to generate his interest. He so often got tired of set plans and was more of a spontaneous sort of type.


    The Master did enjoy his creative moments, but Casey could tell that he certainly felt slightly under the weather as the signs were all there. Support was always available for the Master as he needed.


    ¡®I can¡¯t do it, Casey. I¡¯m sorry about it, you came up with this drama script and the outfit you built is brilliant, but I just can¡¯t get into the role. I know that I was told to get into character to better understand the local population and not just treat them as nameless extras in a drama show but it¡¯s gets so hard to do so. Can you imagine me as a  superhuman?¡¯


    [Sir, I do believe that the original script was for a lone pacifist scientist survivor of a secret research base where your suit was built through the use prototype cutting-edge technology. You left and your colleagues committed suicide through activation of the base self-destruction sequence on purpose. They sent you a final radio message to live on and find any government forces that remained. The reason that you won the suit was through lucky draw. You¡¯re on a secret mission given to you by the Chancellor shortly before the war broke out and all communications were lost. You actually cheated to win the suit and feel a sense of guilt.]


    ¡®¡­You, see? Scientist, not superhuman. I don¡¯t know why I bother wth roleplay on these jobs, I don¡¯t. At least I don¡¯t go around and pretend to rescue them from their reality. You know that guy Britford? He¡¯s an asshole who does it all the time. He does it for the before and after expressions. You¡¯d think he¡¯d have a normal hobby.¡¯


    [Indeed Sir. Remember to keep one foot in front of the other.]


    To raise false hopes would be the absolute worst. I don¡¯t plan to secretly rescue the world through a mission given to me by a world leader which would clean the land of radiation.¡¯


    Too many lies get you caught out, I learned that the hard way when I used to steal food to survive starving to death as a kid.¡¯


    [Sir, your mentor requested that you act out specific roles when working to emphasise the local population and therefore secure better-quality interviews and footage for the tour guides. In her words, she described rather coarsely I might add how doing a bad job led to bad results. If you don¡¯t feel comfortable with your role as a pacifist scientist then feel free to be a superhuman one instead. Your superior abilities would certainly allow you to pass as one on this relatively small planetoid. As long as you¡¯re careful using your inherent strength and physical abilities won¡¯t rip the protective suit to pieces.]


    ¡®Nah. Casey mate, you made so much effort for me so I want, no I need to stick with it. I mean I got the costume and props and everything now. I¡¯ve been looking at the sky for a while now when we¡¯ve been walking and given the amount of light coming through, I¡¯m not sure if I¡¯m going to get any decent above-ground footage. Everything is a bit the same for me. Maybe I should just wait until we stumble across a hidden bunker complex.¡¯


    [You are an excellent photographer Master Horus and that is not only me talking out of pride. I dare say that your footage is truly renowned for the true authenticity that is lacking in so many tour guides these days. If the environmental conditions are an issue, I would be more than pleased to make the necessary changes if you would so let me. Blue skies and sun with pure white clouds can be easily resolved in this particular region as soon as Sir gives me the command. It may take me several minutes to achieve but I can do it easily enough.]


    Shaking his head while they both stood in the middle of the deserted and mainly cracked-apart highway Horus put his hands on his hips and looked back the way that they¡¯d come. It all looked pretty similar when everything was smashed up. He did think that he could see several hundred miles in the distance a series of mountains, he could see them enough but he wasn¡¯t overly focused on the details instead tapping a gloved hand where his chin would be under the masked visor that covered his face.


    He only realised a few seconds after doing the action that his face was covered and he was simply tapping the outer layer of his protective suit.


    A shadow appeared above


    ¡®Casey?¡¯ asked Horus.


    [Yes Sir, all recordings of your superhuman action have been removed and I have had to forcefully terminate approximately twenty-six lifeforms in the nearby vicinity.] responded the floating suitcase.


    Even the most simple of actions Horus knew could rapidly change this planet. All he needed was rumours of survivors of a superhuman figure that could control the local rules of physics before he ruined it. It was less likely that he¡¯d get in trouble for it but points would still be deducted and he¡¯d lose out the promised bonus.


    ¡®The life of a freelancer. Casey, do me a favour and do not tell me how many of those lifeforms were human. I know that most of them are going to die but let them do so in dignity. Did you choose a quick death for them?¡¯


    [A shutdown of their heart and brain functions. Instantaneous death without awareness. A mercy Sir.]


    ¡®Yeah. You did a good job.¡¯


    Horus looked at the now small explosions which were now starting when the gas station had impacted in the field. Nothing special to his eyes but still a tiny new variable.


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    ¡®We¡¯re not here to make unexpected changes to the global environment Casey. You know the rules we need to follow, untouched and pristine without unnecessary changes or the tourists won¡¯t come and visit. Imagine a patch of an area with blue sky and bright sunshine coming through. It¡¯d ruin the whole experience and also be noticed by survivors, there¡¯d be towns popping up everywhere. People would begin to call it a blessing from heaven. No, people pay for the total experience package, and we need to aim for that natural unspoilt environment. Everything needs to stay as it¡¯s developed so far.¡¯


    [Of course Sir. I would dare to say that it could be easily undone if you only wanted a quick photo opportunity. Environmental change notwithstanding, this planet would use a little bit of a clean-up. The inhabitants don¡¯t take care of their environment much, all a bit grey and brown in my view along with a touch of gamma green of course.]


    Horus sighed aloud. Occasionally, the sheer scale of the death and destruction of planets got to him. Especially when it meant the footage, he was able to take was worse in quality, good promotional material for the tourism board had always been a challenge. Too many guides and not enough money to spread around.


    ¡®Nobody does, not after a limited nuclear war. But we¡¯re not here to change it even if it does sound tempting. Do you know what happened to my mentor when she went too far and got exiled? I learned from her example personally. We may be powerful but we¡¯re not gods.¡¯


    [No Sir, you are indeed not a god. I will take care to remind you of this in the future so you do not mistakenly consider yourself as one. I do believe that was an ancient Emperor once who employed a slave on his behalf to constantly whisper into his ear the fact that he was mortal.]


    ¡®Mortal. Everything is mortal at the end of the day it just depends on how far you can stretch the boundaries. Gods. I¡¯m so far beyond those assholes with giant egos that they can shove off. I¡¯m so happy we don¡¯t have to deal with any local ones for this trip. It¡¯s not as though I set up the apocalypses that they create and ruin their playground. The fact that they get annoyed when I turn up unannounced without their permission for a tour review is my business and not theirs, they ought to be grateful that anyone is still interested in their ruined worlds. Right, now down to business it¡¯s best not to make any changes. Let¡¯s just aim to keep everything clean and simple.¡¯


    [Are you quite sure Sir, it would be a fairly simple modification to make a blue sky and white clouds appear for a few minutes? Including a few special effects would certainly make any gods jealous if they still existed on this planet. According to my scan, they died out when the main religions were suppressed by direct military purges. They can be rather annoying parasites on occasion.¡¯


    ¡®Sounds a bit too much like cheating to me Casey. It might be hard to find the difference but I¡¯m sure people would notice the difference as would I. There¡¯s no way that I want to compromise my integrity by doing cheap stunts like that. No effects, no god impersonations just yet. I¡¯m not officially a god remember. Whisper into my ear in case I become like that Emperor, no, don¡¯t. It sounds creepy.¡¯


    [As Sir wishes.]


    ¡®Now, if this was vampire infested planet where they were allergic to the sun that would be pretty entertaining. Set up some deck chairs and position them a little bit, it could work. For now, though we just need to find a bunker. Doesn¡¯t matter too much about the size. Screw it, how about we just find a base of some kind. Give me a rough idea of what we¡¯re looking to work with here.¡¯


    [I agree about the vampires Master Horus, as usual, I¡¯ve recorded your thoughts and will remind you of the scene if we encounter that particular kind. They are common enough


    across most dimensional realities that we will be sure to run into a nest of them.]


    ¡®Great Casey. You see those mountains over there, in the distance. They might make for some good shots closer up. Especially if this highway runs through them. There¡¯d be hundreds of vehicles all crammed close up trying to escape the blast waves by hiding inside the tunnels trying to escape the worst of it. Even a single survivor hiding inside one of the side doors might make for a tiny bit more interesting material. You never know with these places. Might be an emergency shelter built inside for all we know.¡¯


    [I do believe Sir, that the standard practice in the situation of nuclear war was to also find a place to hide inside. There may have been many individuals or groups who chose to find safety inside the interiors of lorries or vans.]


    ¡®Our job is just to find some decent locations; I¡¯m not going to spend my time ripping off the back doors of vans Casey. I know you already ran a planetary scan but I¡¯m not going to find a seat somewhere comfortable and let you do all the work. Discovering everything is half the run. Otherwise, it¡¯s just running cheat mode and we¡¯re a team, right?¡¯


    [Yes Sir, we are the best team of freelance tourism operators in existence beyond all others.]


    ¡®Was that sarcasm Casey? I didn¡¯t know you had it in you.¡¯


    [Never Sir. I was built to follow and provide support on the orders of your mentor. Please believe in yourself!]


    ¡®I was joking. I think.¡¯


    I was only considering further opportunities for you to make excellent use of your photography skills. Black and white do come out especially well when you take images of human bones and remains. It detracts from the morality of the environment.]


    ¡®I appreciate your thoughts about my camera skills but I¡¯ll get it out in a bit when we¡¯ve made some more distance. I always like to get the feel of a new place and let my feet do a bit of the thinking. You think I¡¯d be noticed walking bare feet or could I get away with it?¡¯


    [I do believe Sir, that the boots are moulded as part of your entire protective suit, they are attached to the legs. You could always rip them off, but it would ruin the overall look of your appearance as a lone scientist survivor. Sorry, superhuman scientist. Will you be needing a piece of weaponry to show your sheer martial prowess?]


    ¡®Nah, not just yet Casey. I¡¯ll let you know when I¡¯m ready, but I do plan to get some great shots this time. I hope this place is better than the planet covered in grey goo. Self-replicating nano machines are pretty stupid when all they¡¯ve been programmed to do is cover and eat. Every single time I cleared enough of them out of my way to take a shot of a landmark they would just swarm back in and try and assimilate me into the greater mass. I mean, I don¡¯t mind using a portable EMP but after you used it a dozen times in a single day it just gets old.¡¯


    [Yes Sir. Certainly Sir. Please feel free to enlighten me further.]


    Horus continued walking along the devastated section of major highway, his rubber soles crunching through minor debris and glass alike. It had been one of the major agreements between the three powers to build these mega highway systems to connect the population centres of each country.


    Stupid roads. They could have used their economics to create more interesting features. Like giant walls separating each boundary and then filling them with landmines and barbed wire.


    His feet crunched through the skull of a corpse wearing a military outfit but Horus paid it little heed, the brains were soon wiped off on the surface of the hard wearing asphalt road as he remained focused inside his own thoughts.


    The half-burnt tank that was in his path was brushed aside with little to no effort as he bumped into it with his shoulder.

 Book 1 Ch 5: Radioactive Boredom

    His own fault really given that he had asked Casey to select a standard planetary reality with average laws. If he was really lucky the nuclear weapons would cause a permanent shift in the rules of physics here but he doubted it.


    Gods or ancient deities would have usually picked up on his presence or that or the other operators by now and would have come to have a few choices words with him. Then the cries for help or mercy would begin, he had little tolerance for interfering deities. As fae as he knew the population of the small planet believed in either the state, themselves or worshipped nature. Nothing special.


    He carried on walking as Casey followed a few metres behind recording his movements and actions for both review and materials. Besides the wind picking up every so often and debris flying towards him which he easily avoided he just stayed inside his radiation protection suit listening to the machinery which would have kept a standard human alive and functioning.


    I¡¯m going to need better footage than this soon. Still, gotta follow the rules that the old lady set down. Out of respect at least.


    The landscape after a point was fairly boring, fire blasted fields on each side of the barriers along wit hundreds of vehicles interspersed and gas and rest stop stations every so often that would lead off the highway. The structure itself had been built well enough to withstand the winds and shock damage produced by the nuclear blasts but most of the bombs had been dropped on residential area on the continent.


    Horus supposed that there could be isolated pockets of humans living far out in the vast ocean undetected and not disturbed but the landmasses that they would be occupying would be tiny by comparison. In other words, boring. Seriously boring.


    He considered making his life a little more interesting by seeing how far he could throw a vehicle off the highway or if he should have just flown overhead instead but his mentor has always told him that he needed to stay grounded. In this case, he was taking it literally.


    ¡®Walking down a long and irradiated dead road¡­¡¯


    [Sir?]


    ¡®Just singing to myself Casey. I¡¯m getting bored.¡¯


    [You did choose to walk Sir. I am perfectly capable of scanning this entire continental landmass and picking out any suitable locations worth sightseeing or hidden underground facilities.]


    Horus kicked a truck in front of him and watched it careening down before it smashed into a small pile up of vehicles with a shattering sound. He felt slightly better for it and could always claim that the wind had effected it.


    Cracking the highway systems would have created an interesting effect but it would be like a firework, saved for special occasions. Not to mention that his energy usage would be strictly monitored against tampering too much.


    ¡®Forget it. I said that I¡¯d walk and we¡¯re going to walk unless we can find something interesting. You need to follow an organic process, just let the destroyed enviroment and ecosystem talk to you. I¡¯m not talking about the moans of the dying. Could you close those off from my hearing range? Just for five minutes? I need to concentrate a little here.¡¯


    [Of course Sir, given your current build you are quite capable of editing your own biological functions but I understand that out of etiquette you are asking on my behalf out of politeness. You are as always a gentleman to the core Horus.]


    ¡®I guess. Thanks. Ah, much better. Maybe just allow a bit of the sound of the crackling of fire and the collapsing of debris. I need to hear the music of the dying world to get a better feel for it. That came out wrong, I¡¯m not a sadist.¡¯


    [No Master Horus. Adjustments made. Please enjoy your walk. I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll find a particular something here as you always do.]


    ¡®Thanks for your vote of confidence Casey. Walking now.¡¯


    Horus had been expecting more from this world beyond the major highway sections, which were still surprisingly intact. The one piece of technology that they¡¯d been able to grasp seriously well had been building roads. Just a shame that they hadn¡¯t realised how to make them sentient.


    Global nuclear wars always offered a good variety of options. Survival and structures would be at the behest of radioactive winds and the environment always changed in new and interesting ways.


    Mostly dead but still interesting. It depended on what stage the war had taken place, there could also be other variables such as mutated lifeforms of zombies but Horus highly doubted that it would be here. The types of radiation made a big difference with that but this world was one of the tame ones.


    ¡®I¡¯ll have that camera out now Casey. I should get in a bit of practice before the main events and all that. All those corpses will eventually ripen and explode after a while. ¡¯


    The floating suitcase opened up and an orange box with a single lens flew out and into the waiting hand of Casey who touched it and then held it in his hand and held it close to his shielded face trying out a few practice shots.


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    [There you go Sir; practice does indeed make perfect and all that jazz.]


    ¡®Thanks.¡¯


    Contrary to popular opinion a standard reality experience was just that. The laws of physics, biology and chemistry didn¡¯t change when a nuclear war broke out. Not if you chose to carefully filter it as Casey had done for Horus. He had specifically chosen a base reality with no biological or chemical weapons this time. They might exist but they wouldn¡¯t have been widely used. Not this place would be a straight-up nuclear wasteland, not a reanimated corpse world.


    A planet full of zombies was a different experience. It was fun to crowd photoshoot the zombies in well-known locations and the existing structures and landmarks often took a great deal less damage. There was even an opportunity to dress up the bodies and depending on their reactions, speed, and life expectancy it would make for entertaining video footage. Harder to pull off but generally worth it.


    You just had to make sure that you always identified the exact cause of the virus each time otherwise you¡¯d end up with a nasty rash for days. At least that was what he¡¯d heard when he was back talking to other freelancers, Horus himself had been lucky enough never to have experienced that and he always made that he was updated against any viruses before each mission. Getting a nasty rash on his arms didn¡¯t sound like much fun at all and to be fair if you allowed yourself to get bitten by zombies then you deserved it.


    After he was done here, he might try out a few of the planetary realities that were listed on the forums.


    You could never go wrong with zombies for a tour group as long as you got past all the decay and rotting flesh. Humans were so creative with their zombie worlds but for now, he was trying for an old-school feel with this nuclear-blasted planet.


    He didn¡¯t overly care for futuristic technology right now and he wanted to see how a retro feel would fit with the tour agency, in one sense Horus was trying to get above the curve before it would become overly popular and everyone wanted to join in.


    This time it would be an old-style photo and video shoot. Being creative was fun but sometimes you needed to get back to basics with some black-and-white photos with a monochrome background. He had specifically asked Casey to locate a planet that was small enough to be easily traversable but also lacking in technology and other reality slices that were too odd. He just wanted to go old-school this time, a nice simple nuclear war on a smaller-sized planet. Not too much for most tourists or it could even start as a nice taster experience before they moved onto larger-scale post-apocalyptic worlds.


    Even if he didn¡¯t get the numbers, he could still rack up the ratings and boost his overall performance scores, as a freelancer he certainly needed any edge he could get. His mentor had warned him about cheap stunts though such as artificially trying to generate interest by setting up events so he had strictly avoided that so far.


    [Would you be needing anything else Sir, or may I now close myself to better facilitate your trip? I have detected multiple life forms approximately five hundred miles from here. It might even be an underground fallout bunker. You do know how much Sir loves the architecture and stylish nature of those. I do not believe that it is one of the ones that the governments of one of the three sides of the conflict would occupy. Or if so, it is one of the smaller ones as I am only detecting approximately three hundred human lifeforms. And quite a few animal ones as well. No rats though. Livestock I believe.]


    ¡®Wait for a second, this suit doesn¡¯t work with the camera so good. Ah!¡¯


    The man was fumbling with his camera before he decided to just string it around his neck. It was filled with quantum so he in theory had an unlimited camera and video footage. He hadn¡¯t been listening to the sales rep at the time when he purchased it on that orbital space station a few hundred visits ago.


    The main reason he liked it was because it made him feel more like a real tourist. It was a large chunk of orange with buttons that receded and appeared when necessary. He also liked to see how far he could throw it sometimes and watch it bounce occasionally.


    ¡®Gonna get some good shots. Yeah, that¡¯ll do. Oh, sorry, Casey. I guess my time-wasting doesn¡¯t ¡®suit¡¯ you. Wait, did you just say livestock? Who brings cows and sheep into an underground bunker? I was so sure about the rats thing being true. I bet the cockroaches are there in numbers though. Why livestock?¡¯


    [I would imagine those in need of a decent steak Sir or a nice bit of lamb for the sake of variety of a menu of freeze-dried protein packs and tinned produce. I¡¯d surmise they would also have a form of growing vegetation for nutritional purposes. Fresh food is always popular no matter the reality Master.]


    ¡®Yeah, it¡¯s true. Even if they think of me as fresh meat, it is popular. I¡¯m thinking this might be one of the private rich ones, not really what I was looking for but still worth a shot. The look on their faces when they see how the quality of my suit would be even better than the military sector.


    People who call themselves seriously wealthy always make me laugh. Having financial assets doesn¡¯t make you a superhuman.


    Horus paused his movements for a moment remembering the final moments of the man who had literally thrown bags of money at his face demanding that he be saved due to his status as one of the world¡¯s richest men. He came across as quite a panicked man in his forties, not overweight but worn out, not surprising considering the amount of work he must have done to get to his position.


    It was the look on his face that had made Horus angry, he tried his best to not react to it but he remembered starving in the desert when the rich merchants had walked past him, their sandaled feet kicking up dust in his face.


    He had been so young back then, begging for scraps on the corners of what they called the clay bricks that made up the town and stealing sips of water where he could to survive. When the rich merchants saw him approaching, they simply spat on the ground at his feet and told him to lick it up as it was as generous as they were prepared to be.


    The so-called richest man on his planet had been stuck on the top of a massive military vehicle surrounded by thousands of zombies who while not threatening him directly stopped any hopes of his escaping. Horus considered that the man must have run out of food and water for some time as he had been sitting on the roof surrounded by briefcases and sacks simply stacked with banknotes and other valuables.


    Horus had literally been air-walking his way through the remains of the financial district. His face had looked amused as tens of thousands of hands had reached up in the sky towards him and moaned as they saw a piece of meat in their eyes walking across the air of the streets.


    Casey had taken the high ground and was orbiting the upper sky limits of the city relating information back to him where the most preserved and funniest dressed zombies were trying to break into the tower blocks where survivors remained. He had been looking for decent footage and trying to see if he could spot anything original when he saw the massive military vehicle surrounded by a groaning horde.


    When the man had spotted him, he shouted for his attention as Horus casually walked across the air above him and looked down, orange camera held in both hands with the patience of a saint and the presence of an angel.


    The man had then began screaming in his direction as Horus tried out a wide-angle camera shot of the crowds piling up against the edges of the vehicle, making it rock due to their sheet weight of numbers.


    He began shouting for help before seeing that Horus failed to pay any attention to him the man had grabbed the nearest sack of money and thrown it up into the sky where it had bounced off Horus¡¯ feet and split open to create a makeshift purple banknote cloud in the air.


    Bored. Walking. Bored.


    His feet continued their casual walk along the road, the same setting flashed by as he didn¡¯t realise that his movements had picked up their pace. He was walking faster now than most vehicles would drive at an average speed on the planet as his mind remembered.

 Book 1 Ch 6: Wealthy Memories

    That had been the photo opportunity that Horus had been waiting for as he rose up into the air a dozen metres to take decent video footage before lowering himself down onto the roof of the military vehicle much to the surprise of the man.


    Horus saw his eyes. Greedy things full of desire and want. He began to shout that all of the money on the roof of the vehicle was for Horus if only he would save him or give him his flying equipment.


    Shaking his head, Horus had kicked the bags and containers full of money with a little bit of force sending them flying into the air where they had also split open and temporary money clouds were formed with a mixture of valuable gems, gold coins and plastic cards.


    Holding his orange quantum camera and ignoring the shouts of the man and the now pest noises of the zombie crowds he took a panned the scene and took a long panoramic image. The look on the face of the man had been same the as when the raiders had come to butcher them and steal their goods.


    Horus had been fortunate enough then to have his fill of revenge from borrowed hands because he had been the one who had broken the wheels on their goods wagons so they had been unable to escape. He wasn¡¯t worth the time for any raider to kill, skinny starving thing that he was and one of the raiders had even thrown him a roasted chicken on a skewer and a flask of water out of pity.


    That had been a good month, the raider had kind eyes, similar to that of his mentor when he had stolen her bowl of fresh noodles but far less fierce. He¡¯d starved even less for a few weeks after he scavenged through the dead bodies before soldiers from the capital city arrived on their white horses.


    Once he had taken the camera footage, Horus signalled to Casey to store it away and asked for the nearest location of a secure military base that hadn¡¯t yet been overrun. No tourists enjoyed seeing a world completely overrun by zombies unless they were particularly morbid. This post-apocalyptic world only had a seventy-two percent chance of being completely overrun due to the heavily militarised nations and tribes that lived here so it wouldn¡¯t have been too hard.


    He¡¯d spoken to the man then, thinking to give him just one chance to show Horus that he wasn¡¯t the same as the greedy merchants who had spat at his feet and called it charity for a beggar boy.


    ¡®Hey, would you like to go somewhere safer then this?¡¯


    Horus gestured to the zombie horde surrounding them as various dying screams echoed around them from the buildings in the financial district as reinforced doors were broken through and survivors tried to escape.


    The military vehicle was rocking even harder now. For a moment Horus had considered asking Casey to store it away a novelty to remind him of the footage. He decided to do it later to make sure that everyone was dead by the time it got stored away. The rotting flesh smell and dead bodies inside could be vacuumed way easily enough.


    He changed his mind and decided that he should show the people dying in the city in their droves as the reanimated bodies of their deceased friends a good time. They deserved to be cheered up. He focused his attention on the massive military vehicle underneath his feet and connected his attention to the loudspeaker before activating it with a full playlist of his favourite songs.


    ¡®One good turn deserves another right? If the guy didn¡¯t throw all those thousands of banknotes, then the video wouldn¡¯t have been as funny. Hundreds of zombies reaching up in the air groaning as money fell from the sky around them were brilliant footage.¡¯


    ¡®Yeah, you do have a sense of humour don¡¯t you Casey? Not as good as mine of course but still pretty good. Wow, I¡¯m getting so off track here. How about when we¡¯re done with this place, we go to a zombie planetary reality? Or vampires. Not much difference really.¡¯


    [Of course Sir, for now, though we have found a suitable bunker awaiting your sincere presence. A small to medium-sized structure from my scans. No weaponry appears to be prepped or any military or aircraft bases in the vicinity.]


    Hey, do you think they¡¯ve had a command structure meltdown yet and there are factions at play? Or it¡¯s a bunch of rich people throwing tantrums. I dunno.¡¯


    [I would believe Sir that they might need a little longer than a day after a global nuclear exchange to suffer immediate breakdowns in the command structure. Usually, it would take some time to adjust to a new reality where your entire family and society had been destroyed. Then again, humans are so good at adapting so I¡¯m afraid that you¡¯ll just have to wait and see Sir.]


    ¡®Ah, right. I forgot the time delay effect. My body is still adapting to this dimension. Say how long would it take roughly for the radiation to die down to acceptable levels where they can walk outside in protective suits?¡¯


    [An answer which surely depends on their level of technology. From my understanding, they would surely be relying on a combination of an insulating mixture of rubber and lead along with a mask for filtering out any particles. It would be hard for me to tell you exactly unless we were given immediate access to one at this moment. The technology level on this planet does differ between the three main countries that dominated the war. I would estimate a six-month minimum but the weapons used are generally not overly powerful as to completely blanket the planet in lethal amounts of radiation. Most of the main population areas were targeted either directly or indirectly.]


    ¡®Six months trapped inside a bunker. I bet anyone would get sick of steak and beans by that point. I make them a bowl of freshly cooked noodles and they¡¯ll probably elect me as their new leader. The best leader ever in the history of best leaders. I¡¯d like to see anyone else giving them fresh food on delivery. I would be able to teach them the ancient arts of cooking fresh soup noodles, clearly essential post-war skills in demand.¡¯


    [Sir is indeed a fountain of good humour and a man of many good merits. You do have the power of fresh soup noodles at your disposal. Now, if you do have your camera ready, we should get a move on. The radioactive storms have yet to settle yet if you want to have a decent light source for your footage.]


    ¡®I¡¯m really lucky to have you, Casey. You were the best purchase that I ever made. I¡¯m pretty sure that you were the first purchase that I ever made. C¡¯mere buddy, bring it in for a hug!¡¯


    [¡­.]


    Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.


    It was an interesting sight to see if anyone in the area had still been alive to see it and it wasn¡¯t located in the middle of a radioactive wasteland. A figure in a radioactive protection suit equipped with filters on his back with a bright orange rectangular box hanging from his neck was awkwardly holding on tight to a floating dark blue suitcase that would be more suited to an airport check-in desk. The luggage slammed shut tightly before it shifted its position and bobbed in the direction of the man.


    [Sir, thank you for your kind hugs but I do insist we get a move on. Unless you prefer a decent view of the same radioactive wastes, it certainly doesn¡¯t offer any form of splendour that would find with a little bit of effort.]


    ¡®Yeah. Guess you¡¯re right Casey. You lead the way and I¡¯ll follow you. I hope that it¡¯s going to be a retro-style bunker. It¡¯s kinda hard to tell the level of technology and style when everything was flattened with a nuclear warhead.¡¯


    [Of course.]


    ¡®Do see that place ahead of us? Looks like this road was leading somewhere after all. It must have been a pretty massive site originally before it got flattened by a bombardment.¡¯


    The remains of the cracked and broken asphalt road had ended with Horus looking onward towards a plain ahead of him that was destroyed. There were still minute traces of buildings and heavily built structures but judging from the warning sounds coming from his suit the radiation in this vicinity was far above any standard that a living being could survive.


    [Multiple warheads Sir. I do believe that this location used to be a military base. You can see the vestiges of the barbed wire fences and other structures. Ah, several of the bunkers seem to only be partially cracked open. I sincerely doubt any normal person would want to live in such ugly buildings. They look hideous, completely lacking all sense of style now if you¡¯ll just board me shortly, we should be there in several minutes unless you would of course care to take a slightly slower pace of travel.]


    ¡®Thank you, Casey. I appreciate your hard work. We make a good team you and me. Hey, do you know where I¡¯d love to visit? ¡®


    The suitcase began to slowly expand Sir as it began a process of expanding to transform into a small single-seater jet plane.


    [Please enlighten me, Sir, if you¡¯d like to board, I can run flight checks and we¡¯ll be there in a jiffy. Would you care for any in-flight refreshments? Mint chocolate?]


    The man wearing the radioactive suit climbed into the newly formed cockpit of the small jet plane before making sure that his orange camera was resting around his neck and comfortable in both hands. If he got the opportunity to see any sights along the way he¡¯d be taking them but for now, he was enjoying talking with Casey.


    Horus paused for dramatic effect before he tried his best to give a serious tone to his voice.


    ¡®Giant mushroom gods. I¡¯d love to see a planet where the population gets infected by a fungal virus. Imagine continent-sized fungal gods. Once everyone died of course or became part of the giant living fungi. Wait, don¡¯t they only grow on dead things? I wonder what powers those types of gods would possess. A better bet would be to grow a mushroom superhuman and then let them spread spores across the planet until they simply grew in size and took over everything.¡¯


    [Yes Sir. Fungal deities do sound reasonably engaging. As we will soon be arriving, are you sure you wouldn¡¯t care for a snack or drink? It¡¯s no bother so supply one from my storage silo. As for mushroom gods, I would imagine that you would certainly need a large supply of anti-fungal medication.]


    ¡®I guess so. I mean a normal human would but I¡¯d probably be able to brush off the spores when they came into contact with my skin. Are we ready now Casey?¡¯


    The small single-seater jet floated above the ground and the main engine roared in response. The plane began to rise into the air similar to a VTOL plane as it rose vertically above the mostly destroyed remains of a country¡¯s military base.


    If there had been any humans around the immediate area they would have been shocked at the speed of the jet, the fact that it still existed after a nuclear war might even have brought hope of rescue from authorities that no longer existed on the same scale.


    There might be remnants of the state government hidden below in bunkers and secure locations, but rescue was no longer a possibility. Amid all the death and destruction, one man was happily chuckling along to himself as he held his camera to the edge of the transparent cockpit and aimed and took footage along the way.


    In a mostly destroyed world, one person still felt a sense of happiness and inner purpose. He was known as a post-apocalyptic tourist. He would turn destruction and chaos into a holiday visit, at least only for him and his only friend Casey.


    As the small jet shot through the air it encountered the beginning of radioactive storms, although it was able to navigate them it still required subsequent energy to be used up. Casey would need downtime to sufficiently recharge his power units when needed.


    The cost of shielding Horus from the radiation which was able to get through the suit was slightly draining but not at a level where it was necessary to create a safe refuge. If they were able to find a secure underground base that was radiation-proof with a decent power source Casey would recharge itself.


    If the inhabitants of the bunker chose to disagree or would not allow entry, then things might get a little messy. The last time this happened Casey had been able to swallow an ocean¡¯s worth of nanobots and recycle their inherent energy sources. Yes, the portable EMP that the Master had used had worked for a short period, but it had proved ineffective in the larger area.


    It would be likely that a fast recharge period would provide enough energy. It wasn¡¯t as though the Master didn¡¯t have his defences and weapons. On a genetic level, he had been changed but it was the thought that mattered. A suitcase was to protect its master from harm even if they weren¡¯t at risk.


    [Drawing closer now. Have you prepared your usual speech Sir?]


    ¡®Sure, I¡¯m not a threat, I¡¯m only here for the sights. I promise I¡¯m not here to take anything or cause any harm or damage. Would you like a bowl of noodles?¡¯


    [Yes Sir, it does sound polite in that tone of voice. Are you sure that you need to include a bowl of noodles with your speech?]


    Horus put down the camera that he was holding with both hands and looked forward towards the far horizon. There were still fires and explosions raging throughout the distance. He gazed at the destruction of an entire planet¡¯s ecosystem, it might recover in time and life would grow again but during this time the surface was being razed and immediate survival was a priority.


    His tone became more serious unless his usual jovial self.


    ¡®Casey. A long time ago I was starving in the streets of a city lost to the sands of time. I remember a woman came up to me and asked that very question. It was a life-changing moment. Even when she nearly beat me to death with her bare fists. Ah, happy memories.


    Casey kept its silence as the jet continued rushing towards the underground bunker location.


    Only a few  metres left, he asked Casey silently to slow down a little to give him some time to enjoy the journey.

 Book 1 Ch 7: Soup Noodles

    In truth, he was filled with memories of his old mentor and he preferred that his best friend didn¡¯t see the tears that threatened to fill his eyes.


    ¡®She said to me ¡®Excuse me young man, but did you just steal my bowl of freshly cooked meat noodles?¡¯ It was that moment when I ate the noodles in front of her and drank the soup slurping it down as fast as I humanly could that she began to beat me to death within an inch of my life.¡¯


    Horus bowed his head in the seat of the aeroplane. He almost flinched remembering the epic beatdown that he had received at the hands of a hungry person.


    ¡®Wow, she was a seriously angry woman. Afterwards, she took me in and made me cook hundreds, not thousands of bowls of noodles until I reached perfection. When you were purchased, I used your storage ability to create the opportunity to make enough bowls of noodles to feed countries at the least. But I still remember the taste of that first bowl of noodles to this day, I might not go all crazy and start beating someone up for eating it but I¡¯m happy to make someone feel good even for a single day.¡¯


    [Sir, this may come across as an impertinent question. But what if the person in question doesn¡¯t like eating noodles or smashes the bowl to the ground?]


    Horus smiled to himself. His enhanced eyes picked up on the region of the mountainous area up ahead. No damaged vehicles or any other debris were lying around the base of the mountain. It made sense to him that an underground nuclear-proof bunker would need to be protected through secrecy as well as technology. Hidden entrances and the like.


    ¡®If anyone turns down a fresh bowl of noodles, I can dig it. Not everyone has the same taste y¡¯know. But if someone did smash a bowl of fresh noodles that I had prepared with my own two hands. Well, you know what a hundred fingers said to the face.¡¯


    [Sir, the old expression according to my records is what the five fingers said to the face. A commonly used insult used before immediate violence.]


    ¡®Not according to the old grey-haired angry woman, sorry my mentor. She taught me well as a dimensional traveller. When you get insulted you got to dish it out strong. The reason she beat me so badly was to remind me the importance of not wasting food. It was a moral lesson or sorts. Wasn¡¯t the first time she almost beat me to death though, not after she took me to the tourist board hub. Ah, old memories. I do not miss that place one little bit. Bunch of stuck-up know-it-all¡¯s.¡¯


    [Yes, Sir I do believe that it was one of the reasons that your mentor purchased me for you as an alternative. In her words which were rather vulgar she believed that you could do better than them for companions.]


    ¡®Casey, you are brilliant. But never think of yourself as a slave like the rest of those holders. The tourist board can do what they want with their own place but you and me need to stick together¡¯.


    [Always Sir. I am fully at your disposal as you see fit.]


    Horus didn¡¯t feel like responding to that comment from Casey. Yes, he could be considered as a tool for him to use as he saw fit but he was more like a family member. There were no crowbars in family photos, only brothers, sisters, parents and relatives.


    ¡®Hey Casey, you can pull to a stop now, we¡¯re here. You detected an underground bunker in this location and lo and behold we got ourselves a big old mountain region. Be a great shield from radiation and blast radius. I bet that they even moved into this place before war broke out, it¡¯d be a special treat if they were remnants of the original government. They always tell the best stories. As long as it¡¯s not a bunch of rich survivalists or mutants I don¡¯t mind¡¯


    [Slowing down Sir, please make sure that your seatbelt is fastened, and all equipment is checked and stored aware. We will be stopping at your next destination placeholder name of Bunker Alpha-Zero.]


    ¡®Is that the name for this place in the records Casey? I¡¯m forgetting if this planet had developed a multi-communication network or if they were yet to get to that level of technology. I hope that they had space travel or at least an orbiting space station. Just for that extra touch of realism when you talk to astronauts who saw their entire planet and way of life destroyed below them.¡¯


    [No Sir, I have given it the name as a placeholder only. There was an experimental space program in use but it was mothballed a decade before the war broke out. Resources were considered too valuable to waste on rockets to any of the moons.] Paranormal Encounter Division.¡±


    The jet stopped beside the mountainous region and blew the dust away, the roaring noise was undiscernible to Horus sitting in the cockpit but anyone outside would have been able to hear it for hundreds of miles.


    [We¡¯ve arrived Sir if you¡¯d like to allow me to first do a quick security scan for any robotic patrols or defence systems before you attempt to go the entrance. I am most keen to annihilate any who would seek to block your passage and deny you a most pleasant experience touring their underground facility. Why they should be grateful that you¡¯ve even chosen to grace them with your presence Sir.]


    ¡®Casey. You can tone it down a little bit with the respect. We¡¯re friends, right? I told you; the whole master and servant routine may have worked for my mentor but I¡¯m not her and you¡¯re not me ok?¡¯


    [I would like to agree to disagree Sir. Your protection and comfort are my absolute priority.]


    Horus shook his head in the cockpit, an orange block camera rattling around his neck onto his yellow radiation suit. His body language showed that he was impatient to begin he immediately stood up as Casey performed an emergency vertical landing onto the scorched ground below.


    ¡®You need to learn to relax more Casey. You¡¯ve done a full planetary scan already even before we arrived here. Is there anything that can hurt me?¡¯


    [No Sir. Despite the active heavily militarised presence before the war and the aftermath which has resulted in a 200% increase in gamma rays along with radioactive debris emitting alpha and beta particles there are no records of any weapons capable of causing actual physical damage so to speak.]


    ¡®There you go. So unless they¡¯ve got a black hole generator lying around the place then I doubt that there is anything that¡¯s going to get in my way. Maybe you should do me a favour and let me do the talking with any survivors. You¡¯re great and all but they might not understand the potential that you have in a suitcase. I mean look at the gleam on you right now. Not even a speck of dust in sight.¡¯


    If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    [Yes Sir, I do try to maintain appearances despite the rather dismal nature of this particular reality. It is always important to maintain the sheen on one¡¯s body.]


    ¡®You always look as shiny as the day I first found you, Casey. Not like those other floating backpacks that get rougher each time we see them.¡¯


    [Thank you for your kind compliments Sir, while I do not appreciate criticism of the backpacks they are a little bit rough aren¡¯t they? We of the suitcase case crowd prefer a more refined look.]


    ¡®Those naughty backpacks. Now, do you reckon you need to do a quick fly around here Casey to make sure that we don¡¯t have any competition? I doubt that anyone from the tourism board would be on the planet, but we still need to be a bit careful. I¡¯m not going in for mandatory training again as a punishment, the last time was plenty enough.¡¯


    As Casey flew towards the mountains, he rose higher into the air in suitcase form and then held a holding pattern for several moments before he dipped back down towards the designated landing area where Horus was still standing looking around.


    [I am unable to detect anyone else using this current dimensional frequency as us. Either way, this planet''s size does hold the bare minimum population of a hundred million so it is rather doubtful that it would hold much interest when other trending realities are more commonly sought after.]


    ¡®True. So true. Even for freelancers like you and me Casey it¡¯s always better to try and find original content. Nobody likes to be copied and there¡¯s plenty of that. I have a good feeling about this one, we find some survivors, get some human perspective, a few decent shots and life experiences and it¡¯ll package up real nice. We might even get a bonus time from the tourism agency.¡¯


    [One should always live a life in hope Sir.]


    ¡®Right, right. Let me have a look around here myself for a bit. It seems to be slightly less blasted than other places.¡¯


    It seemed to him that this particular area hadn¡¯t been the target of a direct nuclear attack. It would be one of two places usually, strategic targets that included military bases, weapons development centres, and leadership positions or it would be civilian targets that included cities.


    Crazy Generals liked to destroy everything when it kicked off, retaliation being the name of the game.


    Given that the size of this planet wasn¡¯t too big Horus doubted that the total population would exceed more than a few hundred million. There was a fine timeline in place after a nuclear war would strike, if the technology here wasn¡¯t too high then the possibility of destruction would be low risk.


    Cities and countries would be devastated, and radiation would contaminate the environment, but it would eventually pass, and civilisation could be rebuilt haphazardly. At that point, the planet would be ruined. Humans or the alternate form of life that dominated the planet would rebuild and start the whole process over again. It would usually be a long time until the planet would be available for another apocalypse and that made for bad tour groups.


    The wind swept across the mountainous region; it would be likely that most of the nuclear radiation would have been blocked by the mountains. Given that the technological capability of this world was low, then Horus might have gotten lucky and the main places of severe radiation damage would be those accessible by each side''s air force.


    Still, it¡¯d be a question to ask if any hidden secret areas had survived undamaged. He¡¯d have to make a note of that when he came across any surviving military or government personnel of a certain rank. There were quite a few tourists who went nuts for that stuff, hidden secret government installations where they carried out mass cloning experiments or kept the crashed alien spaceships. That sort of thing. They may even have captured a few of the higher-level beings or gods that existed in this world and locked them away.


    ¡®Casey?¡¯


    [Yes Sir, how may I be of service on this fine slightly radioactive and darkened morning?]


    ¡®That a joke? All the dust clouds make the sun kinda blotted out.¡¯


    [Sir, the time is approximately 7.34 am for this local region. If you could find me an interface for a computer or timepiece for this region, I¡¯d be better equipped to give you a clearer picture. Sir did ask for a specific slice of real-world that had suffered a nuclear war but on a smaller scale. The population of this world was adjusted accordingly.]


    Horus smiled inside the helmet of his radioactive protection suit.


    ¡®I did. What a fine morning it is. Now, can you find the location of the bunker? I wonder if it¡¯s going to be actually inside the mountain, under the ground or a straight silo cylinder. There ought to be cameras above the surface tracking movements or other detection devices. Even radiation monitoring equipment or air ducts are equipped to filter out the dirty air.¡¯


    [I have forcefully expended a great deal of energy Sir in flying here so quickly. While I enter recharge mode would Sir care to explore the local vicinity? I will be shortly ready in approximately thirty seconds and ready to take on any threats supposing there were any.]


    ¡®Alright. As long as no one targets me with a direct nuclear weapon there shouldn¡¯t be an issue. I mean it wouldn¡¯t kill but I¡¯m sure that it¡¯d sting and I¡¯d be stuck walking around naked and become a radioactive man for a while until you got around to washing it off me. Rules are rules. I¡¯m not losing out on a bonus this time.¡¯


    [Indeed Sir. I do believe that now that the bombs have dropped it would be rather unlikely for any existing military presence to decide to drop a nuclear-armed weapon on a single individual such as yourself. I do believe that most people are struggling with the aftermath of the ever-so-brief war and their current state of survival.]


    ¡®Yeah, I guess so. What a photo op it would make though. I could take a selfie with the bomb right above my head about to explode on me. No, every better, a photo of me jumping up in the air to catch the bomb with my bare hands. Nice.¡¯


    [Yes Sir. I am sure that you¡¯ll eventually find your photo opportunity to hold a weapon of mass destruction in your bare hands at some point during this job. Please enjoy your tour of the nearby facility. I¡¯m quite sure that your most keen presence will be noticed in proper order. Will you be needing further assistance Sir?]


    Horus made sure that his orange camera was securely fastened around his neck before climbing out of the small cockpit of the one-person jet plane. His bright yellow radiation suit made a slight crackling sound as he moved.


    Taking a look at the massive mountain sitting next to the burnt-out wastes beyond he sighed. It was a massive shame, all the destruction and death caused by nuclear war made everything that bit more difficult.


    He should have chosen to take out a loan to upgrade Casey then if he positioned himself just on the mountain, he would have been able to get some great footage. Just because he could be mainly unaffected by a nuclear bomb didn¡¯t mean that he would be able to take a video at the


    ¡®


    [Master Horus?]

 Book 1 Ch 8: Hoity Toity

    </a>


    ¡®Nah. Casey? I¡¯m going to take a short walk around. I¡¯ll stay above ground for the moment, but I wanted to see if there are decent selfie sights around here. You know the type, large groups of skeletons crowded around a single entrance. A small convoy of vehicles that heard about the bunker and was oh so close to entering before they got hit by a shockwave from a blast.¡¯


    [Yes Sir, I would like to first scan the immediate vicinity in case there are either a band of ultraviolent brigands lurking around looking to crack open the entrance to the nearby bunker or even mutated animals lurking nearby looking for decent prey to have a light snack before supper.]


    Horus smiled. Casey was always overprotective. The last reality planet with the grey goo had gotten a little out of control sure what with his portable EMP supply running out and swarming like ocean waves beating against him.


    The suitcase had still eaten them all like a vacuum cleaner and given itself a decent power boost. Nanobots had nothing on his sentient suitcase, not when his stomach had a near-unlimited capacity to feed.


    ¡®Seriously, you¡¯re not a servant. We¡¯re partners remember? I think that when I first purchased you from the resource collection depot you could barely form words. Now, look at you, all posh and hoity-toity. I mean I don¡¯t dislike it but still, you need to relax more. Do you think that some raiders can put a dent in me? I¡¯ll bite the animals back too if necessary.¡¯


    Casey had almost finished his transformation back into a brown normal-looking hovering suitcase from a jet. He hadn¡¯t made any fun transformation sounds this time at the request of Horus previously, it had lost its fun after the one time he¡¯d done so.


    [Sir, it is certainly not the threat to your well-being that bothers me. The audacity of anyone who dared to ruin your perfect selfie shot atop a horde of nuclear fire-scorched skeletons. My concern lies with your time being wasted, Sir. After all, I do live to serve.]


    ¡®Mate. When we finish this tour, I¡¯m going to take you back to get your sentience checked out. ¡®¡¯Live to serve!¡¯¡¯


    No. Just no, you¡¯re not a slave and I¡¯m not a master. We¡¯re mates, friends and all. You just take some time to relax and sit back while I find us access to that base. Then you¡¯ll be able to power up and get back some of that energy you burnt off getting us here so fast.¡¯


    [As you wish. I will remain here floating, aware of any threat to your photo opportunities or tour research. Please let me know when you find the entrance and please don¡¯t lose yourself in old memories. She¡¯s gone, Master Horus. It shall do you no good to dwell on the past, I would usually not dare to tell you this Sir, but I am grateful for you finding me. She assigned me to your protection and well-being, and I do take my duties extremely seriously. Not all wounds can be physical.


    Nodding his head to show that he was listening he adjusted his nuclear radiation suit before deciding that it was too stuffy for him to keep wearing all the time. He decided to compromise in the end and took off the helmet and tucked it under one arm. With his other hand, he took his orange camera from around his neck and took a quick photo of his sentient suitcase floating there with the background of a mountain behind.


    Live in the now.


    ¡®Got a good photo of you Mr Hoity Toity Luggage Man.¡¯


    He called out before he walked away and scuffed one thick rubber sole into the irradiated dirt. He should be thankful that his suitcase and friend were so protective of him but occasionally it got too much. Especially when Casey felt the need to remind him about his mentor, it brought up too many memories.


    ¡®See you soon. I need some alone time, ok?¡¯


    The lack of a response didn¡¯t bother him. He knew Casey could hear him from half the planet away, they had been bonded when he had first purchased him. All of the other suitcases on display had been brilliant colours and super excited to see him when he took a look inside their creation room.


    It was the one by itself in the corner that took his attention. A dull dark brown, it was just floating there by itself not rushing around the room like the rest of them. Smaller even as though it hadn¡¯t developed its true growth potential.


    No choice was necessary. Horus pointed it out and helped it grow into the suitcase that it was today. Capable of eating nano swarms that covered the sky within minutes. He was still never really sure if Casey realised how much effort was made to take care of it and the amount of money that he had spent trying to fix him when flaws had been found.


    ¡®Nostalgia was a two-edged sword¡¯ thought Horus.


    Happy memories were always accompanied by bad ones. Always. He continued to scuff his feet through the ground kicking up white pieces of bone and metal that had been blasted here. Earth. Mixed with water it made mud. Not exciting to look at or play with unless you were a kid. Reaching down he grabbed a handful of rocks and debris and crushed them inside his closed hand before letting the dust drop to the ground.


    Not tasty at all. Horus could eat it to fill his stomach if he needed to but one of the main reasons, he chose nuclear apocalypse worlds was for the chance to discover new snacks designed and created to last a lifetime.


    A dead planet held little interest for Horus especially when you wanted to get those face-to-face interviews with survivors for a little slice of life interest. The best part of entering nuclear bunkers was the frozen and preserved food that they had in stock. All those additives made the so-called food last for hundreds of years past its sell-by date. They tasted pretty crunchy.


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    The latter was meant to last past a nuclear war after all. Or it would be tinned food. Irradiated at the moment it was tinned to make sure that it would last for a long, long time. The potato chips still taste pretty good though when he was lucky enough to find them.


    The simple nature of this slice of apocalypse brought back old memories of entirely decaying and desolate worlds. This time it wasn¡¯t quite a fully dead planet but with a relatively small population of only a few hundred million, it would mean that the survivors who were underground in bunkers or survived the after-effects of the war would take a good while to reclaim the planet. Or if the sides who began the war in the first place decided to keep fighting to the death, then it¡¯d work out the same as a dead world.


    Horus knew this one guy who had taken an amazing shot. Two survivors wearing rags of military uniforms were armed with sticks and stones and fought each other, fed on the tales of their ancestors who tried to take over the planet the photo was of the two of them dying of starvation and dehydration at the same time. They leaned on each other, sticks still clutched to the death in eternal hatred of their foe.


    He thought it was the rats who had evolved on that one. Or was it wild pigs? Goats, it was cannibal goats that turned out to be the ultimate survivors. This guy had taken the shot right before the two dead survivors were completely eaten and digested, clothes, worn-out boots, and all. They became a pile of stinking excrement after having finally found their peace.


    A post-apocalyptic world full of dead bodies from a biological outbreak that turned the goats into partially sentient meat-eating, farting machines. Things got pretty boring after that as all they did was eat each other and any surviving fauna or wildlife that was lucky to survive the death of their world. The zombie goats had overrun the entire planet and managed to spread until the continents of the world were full of bleating sounds and anything living in the oceans was hiding as the never-ending hunger of the goats slowly approached the waters of the world.


    He did have to admit that zombie mer-goats were pretty interesting, half zombie goat and half fish along with gills and the ability to swim in vast numbers simply eating anything they came across. More than a few sharks had been surprised at how they¡¯d been eaten apart and so did a few leviathans that were hiding deep within the depths of the ocean trenches.


    A few of the zombie goats had bumped their heads against his knees but as soon as they had found out that he was unedible and Casey gave them a severe electrical shock they¡¯d soon passed on their findings to the rest of the herd and eventually the planet. He did think that it would make a nice little petting zoo for the tourism board. Children always loved goats especially when they would allow themselves to be petted. Being part sea zombie was a bonus and Horus thought that watching animals bite each other without consequence looked good in his eyes. He would have loved seeing it was a kid, it would have made a difference to starving to death in the desert.


    When he had been younger Horus was only brave enough to explore the ruins of places. At least that¡¯s where his mentor had taken him. He wasn¡¯t sure if it was because of his age or the fact that she didn¡¯t like other people very much. Seeing the sad remains of where people once lived was pretty boring from his perspective but then as Horus had grown older, he felt that it wasn¡¯t a case that his mentor had disliked people, but she seemed aged from her experiences.


    He tried his best to take a positive feeling from his experiences, the great views, new sites, and occasional unexpected experiences. Horus did have his personal preferences though. If he ever visited a world that was filled with zombies, he made sure that they weren¡¯t fast-moving ones, those specific realities he ended up marking down for immediate deletion from the tourism board.


    The same applied to the self-aware ones that developed a sense of awareness and could think. Way too complex for tourists to deal with. All the questions and nonsense that they came out with were just frustrating. Horus himself had experienced it far too many times to count now.


    When revived monster humans began talking to you and working out new strategies it just got annoying. Usually, the entire inhabited population of survivors got wiped out and then all you had was this constant warfare and on occasion, a new form of civilisation got rebuilt.


    Nobody cared about zombies driving normal cars around in their day job and then going back home to watch the news, and day-to-day routines. The whole thing got boring fast and transformed everything from an apocalypse tour to a slice of life tv drama.


    Horus didn¡¯t get into the tourism business to become bored. He had met a few people who organised those sorts of tours, easy money minimal risk but the sound of the sheer repetition of it was far worse than that one world he had visited. The one with the lone overpowered superhuman.


    The whole thing with zombies, be they made through science, religion or nonsense ideas was that it was meant to give people a fighting chance. A monster that ran fast or could handle guns just killed the immediate population and ended up with a completely rubbish experience for any visitors.


    The multi-dimensional tourist board would be pretty annoyed if people didn¡¯t get what they expected. There was a reason that the classics worked. He considered that you could have fast-moving zombies, but they had better have a handicap like they could run fast, to begin with, but broke apart after an hour.


    It was some of the worlds where the zombie apocalypse was the most popular. Visitors got the chance to watch the entire process happen over and over again. Until they got bored that was. This is the point that he came in, to act like a tourist and get paid for the experience was his dream job.


    Yes, you needed to work hard but every visit meant a brand-new experience as well as paying off his original debt. Freelance work meant a much harder job, but Horus still followed in the footsteps of his mentor. At least her final gift of money was used to buy Casey. There would be no way for him to do the job properly and with sufficient protection and resources without his sentient luggage.


    It would be doable, but a far bigger headache and he wouldn¡¯t have had anyone to talk to besides the usual survivors who were a mixed bag, to begin with. The military or paramilitary types were rigid, and the crazies were narcissistic and usually cult affiliated. Loner types got boring quickly and the smart, capable leader types recognised him for what he represented. An untapped resource.


    The chaotic ones were the biggest issue. The ones who hid behind a fa?ade and expected him to believe in their righteousness while they planned to kill him or worse. Horus was all for getting into the experience but as a freelance dimensional end-of-world tourist he wasn¡¯t stupid. Occasionally gullible but never stupid.


    He was wondering about the type of social order set-up that the bunker would have inside. A mad general giving out orders slowly losing her mind after the shock of the collapse of civilisation set in.


    Then Horus switched his thoughts to getting Casey to start playing a song playlist as a side event when he introduced himself. His dance moves weren¡¯t too bad and provided that light effects and the right echo settings were set it¡¯d make for a pretty good show. Then he could film the reaction of the inhabitants. The whole thing had been done before, that was the problem. Human interest and all made for a boring scene if he was faced with people who just stared as if they had simply gone insane.


    ¡®See you with a hand wave, gonna make it past you with a close shave.¡¯


    Not good footage when you were a tourist. People were expecting an experience, not a carefully created fa?ade. The real thing really couldn¡¯t be matched in reality. Still, he¡¯d try his best to get the best quality materials and that meant research, interviews and taking as many photos and videos as his orange camera would allow. Which was technically infinite unless he decided to delete it all by mistake. Holding the bright yellow of his radiation-proof helmet under his arm he saw a glint of metal and then, a small part of an air vent carefully hidden.


    ¡®Found you!¡¯ muttered Horus beneath his breath.


    He¡¯d need to inform Casey of his little discovery but now they had a rough starting point for putting together how exactly this small planet broke out in nuclear war.