Tribes of Tundra.
Prompt:
In the near future, genetically-modified locusts who have been designed to swarm continuously escape a laboratory and ravage farmlands across the Earth. The world is slowly dying, but you find a way to survive by growing crops indoors with plant growing lamps and solar panels. The windows and doors of your house are boarded up, but you can still hear the swarm outside as they try to find a way into your home to eat what is left of the world’s vegetation.
“SHUT THE SPRINGLOCK” Kadin shouted, projecting his voice up the stairwell with all the air in his lungs.
Ehsan’s open palms slammed on the single beam of tungsten on twelve inch thick, lead lined door. As he heaved, his shoulders rotated inwards, tensing, with full force as his entire body slanted to push against the weight of the open door, his legs were shaking at the amount of pressure he was applying in an attempt to shut the single entry point to their underground hydroponics lab.
As Kadin reached the ground floor, having sprinted up the long set of concrete steps from the farming well, he reached for the electro-net and his phaser-pistol. He was determined to not let a single of of Agrecent’s locusts through. Their grid of greens were delicate, one ravaging c-loc, a genetically superior creature than any iteration of its species, with cybernetic augmentation, had a single aim – to destroy all unregulated farms outside of Agrecent’s certification policy.
The whirring and metallic clicks of the swarm drew closer, as the scraping of wings and feet started, Ehsan spun the lock and dabbed his brow with the towel fastened to his belt.
“This is the second time this week, I was enjoying the airflow” shouted Ehsan, through his tired breath. “Chai now or you want to wait till the Seekers get back? Should be within the next half hour.”
“Sure, one now, one then, not like I’m on a caffeine cleanse”, Kadin replied with a raised and weary voice, as he put away the electro net and phaser-pistol, back in their rightfully, and easily accessible holsters on the wall brackets.
“You know Agrecent destroyed the Horn’s largest crop barrier, Saed sent a live AR-link to it just as I heard the the wings” said Ehsan.
“I felt my comp vibrate as you shouted down, didn’t get a chance to see it, throw it up on the tablet, if they’ve really got through this is going to devastate millions, they had a localised network for pick-up and delivery. This is going to increase demand around here too, but will start a new famine”, said Kadin, as he sat on the tall stool beside the giant marble table. The noise of the c-loc outside started to fade, this means they were passing through, having cleared a sector, they would continue through the desert until they picked up signs of plant-based organic matter. This is when the swarm would lock on and raze the crops into nothing but green specs of the dust.
As Ehsan joined Kadin at the tablet, he placed down the two cups of chai, and activate the live-link, an augmented reality feed rose out of the marble, projected by a lens from above, embedded in the ceiling. The footage played out a military operation breaching a damn like structure in-between giant sand dunes. Insectoid machinery, the size of cruise liners, crawled through the sand, once at the wall the sound of drills echoed the room, they were pinpointing joints in the structure to break down one of the secure walls to gain entry.
“Resistance is not even an option when they send the regime’s forces, a little skirmish with Agrecent security teams is one thing, but now that they’ve broken through I’m sure the c-locs were on their way there” said Kadin.
“They’re not going to destroy all that crop, and they won’t carry it across to their own facilities, although that would be a real show of power.” Ehsan now becoming animated puts his chai down as he continues, “all the factional districts will now align themselves as expected, stimulating the spread of absolute desperate hunger.”, Ehsan takes another sip as he sighs.
Kadin responds after taking a deep breath, “the Seekers need to make the call to the tribes of the tundra, if this isn’t the time for their battle cries I don’t know what is, the last time they released a live-link was of the capture of subantarctic islands, that was an absolute slaughter.
Ehsan uses a circular touchpad to rotate the AR feed, and zooms into the storage silos, “I still can’t believe the regime didn’t retaliate, not like they haven’t dropped a bio-nuke in the region before”.
“The tribes knew by securing the single space left on Earth protected by a natural elemental shield, their safety would be impenetrable, the only way to engage with them is staying below the dust cloud and by reaching land, and one in their right mind is going to fight a tribal in close quarters.” Kadin makes it very matter of fact, as he places his cup in the little cup pocket groove on the tablet.
A robotic voice chimes out from the ceiling, “Seeker’s have sent a message: Two miles out, Horn’s crop reserve have been taken, this is declaration of war, signal sent to tundra” Ehsan and Kadin both sit up, brows open wide, as they look at each other the comms system plays one more message, “Tribes of Tundra have acknowledged, war is coming.”
