Apocalypse Trade Monopoly
Chapter 89: : Market Value

Chapter 89: : Market Value

By midday, the skyline ahead began to change.

Most of the ruins they’d passed were skeletal—half-collapsed residential blocks, crumbling office towers, streets clogged with rusted cars and silence.

But now they stood before an old commercial plaza, its signage warped by heat, letters hanging by threads. A faded logo of a grocery chain was barely visible across the cracked windows.

Ava squinted at it.

"This your supermarket?"

Lucas smiled like a cat with a mouse already in its mouth.

"Military used them as drop points early on. Supply caches. Some were decoys, some real. This one’s legit."

"How do you know?"

"Because it’s not marked on the official maps, but there’s still satellite shadow data showing movement in and out of this block long after the fall."

"That sounds like something you weren’t supposed to access."

"Almost everything I know is something I wasn’t supposed to access."

Ava raised an eyebrow.

"You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?"

Lucas grinned wider.

"Come on, Beauty. Little danger, little mystery, private scavenging expedition with your favorite partner? What’s not to love?"

"You talk too much."

"And yet, you keep listening."

They approached the front of the building cautiously. The glass had long since shattered, the entryway partially buried under a collapsed awning and vines that had no right growing in this dead zone.

Lucas slowed near the side entrance, reaching into his coat.

"Heads up."

Ava froze.

Her system pinged an alert a second later.

[LIFEFORM DETECTED – BIO-SIGNATURE MATCH: BEAST CLASS C]

[SECONDARY PRESENCE – LOW MOVEMENT]

Inside the store, two heat signatures flickered faintly on her HUD.

"There’s two." Ava’s voice dropped. "They’re not moving fast."

Lucas drew a short-blade from his belt.

"Good. Means we’re in the right place."

"Because monsters live here?"

"Because only useful places still have predators." He flashed her a grin. "Dead buildings don’t have defenders."

"You’re disturbingly upbeat about this."

"I’m shopping." Lucas rolled his shoulders and moved toward the door. "Just happens the sale includes murder."

Ava slid her blade free and followed.

They slipped through the side, silent.

Inside, the air was stale and cold.

Shelves were collapsed. Dust coated the floor in a thick layer. Half the ceiling tiles had caved in.

And somewhere near the back—

A low, wet breathing.

Then a skitter.

Two shadows moved between the frozen aisles.

Lucas smiled wider.

"Told you."

The sound came fast—closer now. Low growl, wet and wrong. Like something human trying to remember how to breathe.

Lucas didn’t wait.

He darted forward, moving between the broken aisles like he’d done this a hundred times. Blade in hand, coat sweeping low, boots silent on the dust-covered tile.

Ava stayed just behind the edge of a collapsed shelf, eyes scanning her HUD as her system flared to life.

[ENGAGEMENT DETECTED]

[TARGET: BEAST CLASS C – MUTANT VARIANT]

[SPEED: 3.1x HUMAN AVERAGE

][DEFENSE RATING: 47% – WEAK POINTS: SPINE, INNER JAW]

She caught the creature in her system’s vision overlay—its body twisted, humanoid in shape but hunched on all fours. Arms too long. Skin mottled like boiled leather. Its head jerked unnaturally as it moved, mouth opening wide in a smile that wasn’t a smile.

Lucas launched straight into it.

His blade struck clean—angled for the throat, just under the hinge of the jaw.

[CONTACT – IMPACT CLEAN][SYSTEM FEEDBACK: STRIKE SUCCESSFUL – CORE UNSTABLE]

The beast shrieked—loud and gurgling—but its claws lashed upward as it died, slashing across Lucas’s forearm.

His coat’s left gauntlet sparked violently.

[GEAR DAMAGE DETECTED][INTEGRITY FAILURE – RIGHT FOREARM MODULE OFFLINE]

Lucas stumbled back, flipping the blade in his hand, expression tight.

"Dammit."

The second beast lunged from the shelves.

Ava raised her arm, system already running the model.

[SECOND TARGET: ENGAGING][DIRECTIONAL ANALYSIS: RIGHT FLANK – WALL BOUNCE ATTACK]

She didn’t hesitate.

"Lucas, right wall—duck!"

Lucas dropped low just as the beast ricocheted off the shelving, claws tearing through empty air.

It landed with a snarl, head snapping toward Ava.

Lucas surged up behind it, gritting his teeth as he drove his blade into its spine.

The creature convulsed—and dropped.

The supermarket went still.

Ava stepped out slowly, eyes still scanning the room.

Lucas stood over the second body, breathing hard. Sparks flicked from his bracer, the exposed wiring along his wrist glowing faintly.

"This is why I hate fighting in tight spaces," he muttered. "Always wreck the damn suit."

[STATUS: COMBAT COMPLETE][ENERGY CORE DETECTED – 2 UNSTABLE SOURCES LOCATED]

She tapped the overlay, locking locations.

"Cores are still good," she said. "Both of them."

Lucas glanced at her, grin crooked despite the smoke rising from his gear.

"Well, look at that. Shopping trip paid off."

Lucas knelt beside the twitching corpse, the beast’s flesh still steaming where his blade had pierced the spine. His hands moved with practiced speed—clean, surgical.

Ava stood guard, eyes locked on the shattered front of the store, system still pinging faint proximity alerts.

Lucas sliced clean through the creature’s chest cavity and reached in, unbothered by the blood or heat. He pulled out the core—a fist-sized, glowing fragment pulsing with violet light and faint heat distortions.

[ENERGY CORE EXTRACTED – BEAST CLASS C]

[CORE STABILITY: 78%]

[POTENTIAL VALUE: HIGH]

"There we go," Lucas muttered. "That’s the good stuff."

He slid the core into a shock-resistant case strapped to his thigh, then turned to the second body.

Ava’s system lit up again.

[ALERT – MOVEMENT DETECTED – 240 METERS]

[SOURCE ID: MILITARY – SCOUT UNIT – 3 SIGNATURES MATCHED]

Ava’s breath caught."Lucas."

He looked up. Her eyes were already on the door.

She didn’t need to say more.

Lucas moved fast—grabbed the second core in a single, messy pull, tossed it into the case without inspection. Then he turned toward her, eyes flicking once to her pack. Her stance. Her fatigue.

He didn’t ask.

He just picked her up in one smooth motion.

"Hey—"

"Later," Lucas said, voice tight. "They’re close."

He bolted through the side aisle, Ava in his arms, one arm wrapped tight around her waist, the other shielding her head as they burst through a collapsed exit door.

Outside—the wind, the ash, the echo of boots hitting cracked pavement somewhere too close.

[MILITARY SIGNAL – 80 METERS – CLOSING FAST]

Lucas didn’t stop.

He ran hard, ducking between alleys and over fallen fences, his pace shockingly steady for someone carrying full gear and a human body.

Ava held on, one hand gripping the strap of his coat."You don’t have to carry me—"

"You want to argue about it and get shot? Be my guest."

Another block passed.

Another warning ping.

But then—they ducked into a drain tunnel, barely wide enough to move through. Lucas dropped to one knee, setting Ava down just inside, then sealed the hatch behind them with a rusted bar.

Silence.

Breath.

Lucas leaned against the wall, still holding her arm.

"And that, Beauty," he said between breaths, "is why we walk places. Bikes don’t fit in storm drains."

Ava looked at him, heart still hammering.Then she punched his arm."Next time, warn me before you sweep me off my feet."

Lucas grinned.