Fortnite: Project Mecha

Epilogue

I reccomend reading the Secret Recipe chapter from my Fortnite Island Bonus Chapters book, it will provide some context to this chapter. Enjoy!

The mesa was being baked by the relentless sun and the dry air. Lungs burned, people cried out for help. People would die of thirst today, as they did most days. Kondor saw them everywhere, those too far gone to help them. He wished that he could help them, but he also needed the water, and so did his friends for their health and their business. That was why Kondor had been out. He was collecting water from a nearby river for the business.
Well, it was technically Mancake's business and not all of theirs. The Butter Barn; they sold stacks of jacks and jugs of maple syrup, or however that particularly annoying advert phrased it. Mancake had sung it so Kondor hadn't said that it was bad, but maybe honesty would've been better. The island's population was pretty split on it, but there were just a few more people that were against the ad than for it. Kondor hated that he was on the winning side.
Something else which he had never said was how he thought that Mancake - the man who was also a pancake - sold pancakes. It would be as if himself or his other friends Mando and Menace sold chunks of human flesh. Other people wouldn't even have thought of it, but Kondor had a dark mind.
However, that was not his fault. A long time ago, a time Kondor could barely remember, he had been cursed. Cursed by a demon to carry said demon around until Kondor passed on, which would be a blessing by the end. The demon pointed out things like Mancake's cannibalistic actions. It lived in Kondor's mind. It played with Kondor as if he was some expendable action figure.
The demon's existence was also marked in Kondor's physical appearance. He was a human, yes, but he didn't look like one. He was made of shadow. He lacked a face. He looked like he was bound to an eternal mist. Maybe he was. Even Kondor didn't understand how it fully worked.
But he knew that worrying about himself was not his priority. In the distance, the Butter Barn came into view. It was surrounded by cars, which meant that business was booming despite the party going on at the tropical base known as 'Sanctuary'.
The cars all matched. They were black SUVs, with strange markings on the doors. It wasn't that the marking itself was strange, in fact it was very simple. An X. It just felt... out of place. Kondor couldn't put his finger on it.
They're in danger.
It was the demon in Kondor's mind.
"They might be. I'll stay vigilant." Kondor agreed, his voice as quiet as a crisp, Autumn breeze.
Vigilant isn't good enough. You know already that if you die, I die. And you know what that means.
"It means that you'll kill them." Kondor gulped weakly.
Kondor's friends, too, were cursed until Kondor would leave them. Before Kondor had been cursed, he had been a child. Of course. The demon had attacked the village where Kondor had grown up, and almost everyone had died. But Kondor, still ten, had been given an offer. Kondor would be spared, but the demon would live within his mind. To make sure that the promise was kept, the demon also made it so that any of Kondor's current friends would die if Kondor was to unbind from the demon. Not wanting to die, Kondor had agreed.
Since then, he'd learned that there were worse things than death.
Kondor had planned to live a simple life in a mountain somewhere, where there would be no friends to put at risk. Then, when Kondor had had enough of the demon, he could kill himself. That would be the end of it. That plan did not have any wriggle room. The island rifting Kondor to its blood stained surfaces was beyond wriggle room.
"I need to help them, though." Kondor groaned quietly.
If you help them and sacrifice yourself, them you will be the reason they die rather than them. You don't want that, do you?
"N-no." Kondor stuttered.
Of course not. And they aren't going to die, look. They're just being taken.
Which was still really bad, but that allowed for Kondor to sneakily take them back instead of being forced to fight a bunch or kidnappers. This was better. And yet, Kondor felt his head droop glumly.
You're such a good boy, you know that, right?
It was the demon's futile way of manipulating Kondor. He hated the mainpulation, but what Kondor hated more was how he got a little bubbly feeling in his stomach whenever the demon said he was a good boy. Kondor shook his head in annoyance at the situation.
You don't?
"Um-" Kondor gasped.
Well, that's too bad. You're a real asset. You deserve to be appreciated. I'm glad I spared you.
But it still had considered killing him. The demon's masculine voice purred, making Kondor shiver uncomfortably. There was a note in the voice of the demon as it manipulated him that made Kondor's skin crawl beneath the shadows.
Kondor nodded in response to it, reluctantly of course.
Good boy.
And the distant soldiers loaded Kondor's friends into their cars and they drove away, leaving nothing visible behind.

To be continued...
...In the next saga!