Apocalypse: My Golden Vision Sees Every Drop

The woman clung to Jake Carter's arm, her voice breaking. "Please. Don't leave me here alone."

She wanted sympathy. Jake wanted supplies.

"Five liters of gas. That's the price to ride with me to find the Caravan."

Her face fell. "I... I don't have that right now."

"Then let go of my arm."

"I'll do anything. Just help me."

Instead of releasing him, she tightened her grip, as if worried he hadn't understood what she meant.

Truth be told, she wasn't hard to look at, pale skin, sharp features, a fitted blazer that hinted at a good figure underneath. Maybe a few years past thirty, but still striking.

Before the collapse, Jake might have let a woman like that talk him into anything.

Not anymore. The world had ended three months ago. Order was gone, the infected roamed everywhere, and storms tore through what was left of the cities. Every drop of fuel mattered too much to burn on a stranger's sob story.

And Jake had a good guess who she was. One of the women riding with Old Man Reeves, the kind of "companion" who was supposed to eat well and stay safe in exchange for company. Her name was something like Rachel Bennett.

If Reeves kept her fed and protected, why was she out here scavenging alone?

Had he thrown her out?

Jake had no intention of becoming the next Reeves. His voice stayed flat. "Last time I'll say it. I want supplies. Got supplies, you get a seat."

Rachel's jaw tightened. Everything she'd scavenged was already loaded on Reeves' truck. The moment that thing had shown up back in town, she'd been left behind, and now the whole block was crawling with infected. Where exactly was she supposed to find anything now?

Seeing no give in him, she forced the words out. "What if I owe you? Once we catch up to the Caravan, I'll pay whatever you ask."

"You're joking."

Jake almost laughed. People break promises the second they're safe. Once we find the Caravan, who's to say you don't just disappear?

He shot her an unimpressed look and pulled his arm free.

Her grip had felt nice, sure. But he wasn't the type to let that cloud his judgment.

Watching him swing onto the motorcycle, ready to ride off without her, Rachel panicked. She played her last card, literally.

"Wait. I have a card. I'll hand it over now. When we reach the Caravan, I'll bring supplies to buy it back."

A card?

That got his attention. She'd been sitting on something valuable this whole time. Good thing he hadn't caved earlier, or she'd have strung him along for nothing.

"What kind. Show me."

Cards came in tiers, same as everything else now. Weapon cards were the obvious example, pull a good one and you might walk away with an assault rifle, a grenade, even a rocket launcher. Pull a bad one and you're stuck with a kitchen knife or a pair of brass knuckles.

Rachel dug through her jacket, searching for a long moment before producing a small green card, roughly playing-card sized. She handed it over like it physically pained her.

Jake's eyes sharpened. "A healing card?"

That was rare enough to earn genuine surprise.

In this world, a healing card was worth more than any hospital. Cuts, gunshots, even a bite from the infected, with enough of these, people had supposedly walked back from the edge of death.

He pocketed the card without ceremony, still warm from where she'd hidden it, then gave her a look of mild contempt. "Would've saved us both the trouble if you'd shown me that from the start. Get on."

Relief flooded her face as she climbed on behind him, arms locking around his waist, pressing close like she was afraid he'd change his mind and leave her on the pavement.

"Easy." Jake cleared his throat. "You don't need to hold on that hard."

Her expression flickered, annoyance buried fast, she wasn't in a position to push back right now. She loosened her hold, just barely.

Ignoring her, Jake reached up and pulled off the plain-looking glasses he'd been wearing, turning them over in his hand.

He'd pulled these from a gold card less than ten minutes ago.

Three months into the apocalypse, and this was the first gold card he'd ever laid eyes on. He hadn't even heard rumors of one existing before tonight.

The glasses themselves looked like something off a dollar-store shelf. No enhanced vision, no zoom, no night vision. Nothing that explained the color of the card they'd come from.

While he sat there puzzled, a low rumble rolled out from the town behind them, a building collapsing, the ground trembling faintly under the bike.

The Anomaly was back.

He felt Rachel go stiff against his back, her arms tightening involuntarily around his waist.

Fair enough. Everyone in the Caravan was afraid of that thing. Hundreds of armed survivors had been scattered like stray dogs the moment it showed itself, no formation held, no plan survived contact.

The thing crawling through what used to be a quiet New York suburb was massive, built like some grotesque, elongated centipede. Its rust-colored body was studded with distorted human faces and mismatched, overgrown limbs, the kind of sight that made your stomach drop and your grip on reality slip a little.

The Caravan had wandered into town looking for supplies and woken it up by accident. The group had scattered in every direction within seconds. Now nobody had eyes on where the main body of survivors had ended up.

Jake turned his head, watching the creature calmly.

And that single glance told him exactly what the glasses were for. His breath caught.

No wonder it had come from a gold card. This was absurd. This was exactly what people meant when they said "golden legend" items.

The glasses did one thing, and one thing only, they revealed which of the infected were carrying cards, and what those cards were, the moment you looked at them.

Take the thing crawling through the ruins right now. Something that size had to have absorbed hundreds of infected to grow into its current shape.

And hovering above its head, visible only through the lenses, floated dozens of cards in a rainbow of colors.

Purple item cards. Blue enhancement cards. Red weapon cards.

Even the rare ones, yellow fusion cards, white origin cards, sat right there in plain sight.

Jake's hands started shaking, and he didn't bother hiding it.

With something like this, he wasn't just going to survive the apocalypse. He was going to run circles around it. If he'd had these glasses from day one, he wouldn't still be riding a beat-up motorcycle — he'd have built himself an armored monster of a vehicle by now.

"It's... it's leaving."

Rachel's voice broke the silence, hesitant, when Jake didn't start the engine.

He shook himself out of it, forcing his excitement back down. "I know. Just wanted to make sure it was far enough."

The excuse sounded thin even to him. He turned the key anyway and gunned the bike toward wherever the Caravan had scattered to.

Out here, alone was a death sentence. If he wanted to make it in this ruined version of New York, he needed people around him, whether he liked leaning on them or not.