American Horror: Grind Edition Chapter 69 69: Primitive Society

Once Bob's family was safely back in their car, Brando pulled on latex gloves and crouched down to examine the bodies.

After stripping away the few scraps of clothing left on the giants, the differences beca obvious. Each corpse was deford in its own grotesque way—so with extra limbs, others with twisted faces that could give a child nightmares for life.

Brando worked with clinical curiosity, slicing open chests and muttering to himself.

"Bone density is insane. Muscle fibers are way stronger than normal. These are like bargain-bin biological weapons."

The deeper he cut, the tighter his brow got.

"This isn't right. These aren't anything like the Sawyer family's modified people."

Luke and Lionel leaned in.

"What do you an? New tech?"

Brando shook his head and pointed at the organs.

"Not really advanced, but completely different from what we've seen before."

He looked up at Luke.

"The Sawyer modifications were stitched together after the fact—you could see the seams, the unnatural tissue. These guys? They were born this way."

He stood up, face grim.

"That's not normal. Severe congenital deformities like this shouldn't survive to adulthood in nature. Even if they did, they'd be weak. But these bastards are built like bulls."

Luke caught the implication.

"So this is a self-reproducing tribe of freaks?"

Brando nodded.

"And they clearly have a selection process. They cull the weak and keep the fighters. We're not walking into a lab. We're walking into a tribe."

The mood turned heavy after that.

They slept in shifts through the night.

At first light they watched Bob's family drive away. Lionel stretched and rolled his shoulders.

"This trip just keeps getting worse. We keep dragging innocent people into this ss."

Luke checked his gear.

"That's how cults operate. They screw everything up, then hide among normal people and play victim. Bet you anything their base is full of old folks, won, and kids who look completely harmless."

Brando chuckled.

"Then it's up to luck whether they make it out alive."

Before they left, Lionel kicked in the convenience store door and cleared out every can, pack of crackers, and bottle of water he could carry.

"The owner's long gone. Consider this paynt for last night's bullshit."

The van rolled deeper into the wasteland. Yellow sand gave way to cracked earth and jagged rocks.

After another hour Luke suddenly hit the brakes.

Up ahead on the roadside stood a crude totem made of animal bones and rags, painted with twisted red symbols.

Beneath it lay several half-eaten wolf carcasses, already crawling with flies.

Brando jumped out, gloves on, and examined the totem.

"We're close. Sa style as last night—rough, savage. They're marking their territory."

Luke scanned the horizon. The land was wide open with zero signs of human activity.

"Sothing feels off. Gear up."

The others agreed. Lionel stuffed an ammo belt into a big pack and slung the M60 over his shoulder. Brando carried the C4 and extra magazines, AKM in hand. Luke strapped the chainsaw to his back and grabbed another AKM.

They followed a darker strip of earth on foot.

Soon the ground dipped sharply.

"Park it. We walk from here."

They killed the engine and crept forward—then stopped at the edge of a massive crater.

What they saw below left all three of them speechless.

It wasn't a research facility or a cult compound.

It was a living, breathing tribe.

Dozens of shacks made from scrap tal, animal hides, and broken boards were scattered across the pit floor. More deford people lived in caves dug straight into the rock walls.

A huge bonfire burned in the center. A group of them roasted a massive, unknown beast on long sticks while others hamred bone weapons or tanned hides nearby.

A grotesquely fat woman with six fingers sat at a cave mouth nursing a baby with a misshapen head.

It looked like a prehistoric caveman village.

Lionel swallowed hard, scalp prickling.

"Holy shit… how many are there? A hundred? Two hundred?"

"Roughly a hundred and fifty adults that I can see," Brando said, voice tight. "And that's not counting the ones still in the caves."

He pulled out binoculars and started taking notes.

"Their society is primitive but organized. Hunters, craftsn, even child-rearers. That one on the platform should be their leader."

He handed the binoculars to Luke.

On one side of the crater sat a raised platform built from construction debris and rebar. A throne made entirely of stacked bones sat on top.

A shorter but powerfully built deford man lounged on it. Unlike the others, he wore a relatively intact leather coat. His face was twisted, but you could still see the faint outline of normal human features underneath.

He was the "Father" the survivor had ntioned.

Brando finally put it together.

"This crater was created by one of the old nuclear tests."

Luke frowned.

"People actually live here? Looks like they've been here for decades. Aren't they worried about radiation?"

Lionel snorted.

"Looking at these freaks, I doubt they can even speak in full sentences, let alone worry about radiation."

Right then the leader's head snapped up. Even from hundreds of yards away, his eyes locked directly onto their position.

He let out a deafening roar that echoed through the entire crater.

"Children! Intruders! Go! Bring them back to your Father!"

The pit exploded with howls and screams.

Dozens of deford people poured out of caves and shacks—massive brutes and lanky, fast-moving ones alike.

They charged up the slope like a flood, roaring and shrieking as they rushed straight toward Luke and his team.