It is the year 2159. All the world’s capitols have been obliterated- save South America and Africa (the only continents free of nuclear weapons)- and humanity is no longer able to reproduce due to the over-manufacturing of sex-bots.  There had been three nuclear wars already, first of which involved USA and North Korea and the most recent involving Britain and Iran.  EMP’s and cyber-hacks had taken out the grid long ago, leaving only a strand of humanity left whose bodies could physically adapt to life without WI-FI.  Most of the main bands in the US which were based out of major cities perished as urban conditioning caused them to starve with no wherewithal to survive in the wild.  All that was left were rag tag bunches of malnourished but darkly inspired bands of street trash scavengers who roamed the land with metal detectors seeking alkaline batteries to power their equipment (though these were also needed to power their sex-bots).  Guitarists went back to using hand cranked Pignose amps, with vintage EV megaphones held in front to further amplify the vocals and guitars.

Daryl had long wavy light brown hair and a fair complexion, was about 5’8 (but buff) and a half and he either wore old Terrorizer or Hypocrisy shirt.  He had a pair of acid wash Wranglers with boots, which stunk bad, since there were no laundry rooms anywhere.  He liked to glue the teeth of people he beat up to the front of his guitar, an old scratched up Ibanez with a Floyd Rose system and active pick-ups which he carried with him on his travels.

Armed with a cassette demo and a 90’s generic Walkman and a pack of batteries, he set out across the deserted barren landscape in order to seek the underground record labels who had retreated into nuclear bunkers long ago.  At this point in the future, the internet had been destroyed, along with crypto-currencies (because they got too big) and the central banks couldn’t control them. In this post-apocalyptic world, music was now distributed using the system which had worked so well in WWI – pigeons.  Pigeons were loaded with either cassettes or SD memory cards and sent back and forth to other bunkers, as well as to military bases.  When he would cruise around he enjoyed listening to cassette samplers from Earache and Relativity, from the early 90s, classics like Cathedral, Bathory, BoltThrower, Pungent Stench, Broken Hope, and the like.  It went well with the landscapes, strewn with corpses and turkey vultures, in the hot sun (most vegetation had died off).

On a good day, Daryl would awake and eat some crickets for protein. Then he would boil some of his own urine (that was safer to drink than the nuclear contaminated wells usually), and mix his old fruit bags together into some nasty alcoholic drink.  Sometimes when he bumped into other survivors he used the moldy fruit concoction to get people to leave him alone, by offering them a drink.  The supply chain for gasoline had broken down. Long ago the oil fields and refineries were early targets in the wars.  Fortunately, Daryl had a vintage metallic blue Schwinn three wheel bicycle. Into the back of the bike he loaded his trusty sex-bot Shirley, his silver Ibanez guitar & Pignose amp, his silver cross-bow, a few deer jerky rations, batteries, and old bottle of cheap but aged whiskey.  His pigeon sat atop his shoulder.  And he set out in search of the underground record label nuclear bunkers, to give them his tapes and SD cards.  On the front of the bike was mounted a human skull.

Daryl had been riding across the hot desert for a day and a half, when he came across a village of about thirty (extremely thin) slaughtered social justice warriors. There was lots of blood splattered propaganda everywhere.  He found a few items he was able to scav away for later, mostly canteens. The human teeth bridges were good for customizing his guitar neck and tuning gears, so he took some of those.  Also there was a canteen and a vintage book from the early twentieth century called Notes on a Pianist, which he took a quick look at.  It seems like a good guide as to what not to do in his search for the music industry.  In the book, an esteemed European pianist came to the New World (America) and manages to act snobby and have disdain for the US population (as smelly and ugly).  One of the vegans was still clinging to life despite a large axe chopped through his right shoulder.

“Help me please young man.” He said.

Daryl squinted his light blue eyes and crimped his face together in disgust. “No. I cannot be sidetracked”he said, “I am on a quest for fucking death metal. Now tell me, who did this to you.”

“It was the cannibal hill dwellers, they are working together with the tech titans and have turned the AI hybrids against us.”

“Not much I can do about that,” Daryl said. “Have you seen any record labels around here? No??” And he pedaled on towards the path leading to the hills.

One and a half miles later he came across a conveyor belt with human brains and livers and kidneys heading towards a room labeled “recycling”.  The hybrid bots guarding the compound seemed to be built out of metal strings, bolts, and rods, like a piano turned inside out, but had some human features such as reproductive organs and human lips.  With no natural gas or oil available Daryl assumed this was all the result of Elon Musk and Boston Scientific, whose experiments in the late 21st century had taken over the course of mankind (with human-computer hybrid babies).  Tesla had gotten the original HAARP blueprints and made electricity generated from sub-harmonic low sound frequencies, on top of all the solar advancements.  Having monopolized the technology, he was perfectly positioned to take over with the collapse of traditional supply chains which had occurred.

“Halt. Who goes there? And why should we not recycle you?” the computer voice prompted.

“I am Daryl of the death metal band Heinous Wench Excoriation, and I am on the way to go distribute my demos to the underground record labels. Don’t worry, I killed a few SJW’s along the way, and I will give you some SJW livers and kidneys, plus some demo tapes if you will allow me to pass.” It was a square deal, and the hybrids seemed to enjoy the demo over the P.A. system. They went about their brain-sorting, and were very happy since all they had besides that was a Berry Manilow tape.

But as Daryl passed, a few of the hybrids noticed his sex-bot (sitting in the rear basket of the Schwinn 3 wheel bicycle).

“If you want to pass you will have to let us take turns with the lady,” blurted a particularly obnoxious one. “We have not seen such a ravishing vixen in ages.”

There were a lot of them so Daryl decided the smart thing to do was dispatch his pigeon Smuggy to go get his alcoholic para military friend, Badger (with his bazooka) to help.  Meanwhile Daryl tried to buy some time by telling cannibal jokes, which were really popular in the future.  Everyone was so serious all the time, due to radiation and starvation, that comedy was a really hot commodity.  So the couple of jokes that he knew and remembered ( from his raunchy martial arts instructor) were valuable.

“Two cannibals are eating a clown. One says to the other “Does this taste funny to you?” He jested.
Next he tried , “CANNIBAL: Someone who is fed up with people,” and, “One who loves his fellow man – with gravy.”

But his friend was nowhere in sight. He wound up having to brawl and scam over his own sex-bot, Shirly. Before he fled, he attempted a few spinning back kicks to the head, and some ankle lock attacks.

Another couple of days went by along the trail, mostly writing new songs, and amusingly doing some more reading of that dusty old book he had found. Just when he had started to become worried about his trusty pigeon, it returned. And it was carrying a note which read: “Bring your demo to Stoner Mountain. We might be interested.”  And though he realized his bird had not followed instructions when he had sought help, he was very thankful for this lead.
“Good bird,” he lauded, “Thanks for the lead.”

And he fed him some crickets.

Tags: Apocalypse, death metal, demos, fiction, future, nuclear war, record labels, sexbot