Maxim Vasnev - The Last Good Man

Time: T-Minus 14 hours until impact Location: Military Evacuation Airfield, Gate 4

The runway was pure, deafening chaos.

The roar of the massive cargo planes warming up their engines mixed with the screams of thousands of terrified people. Red emergency lights flashed against the dark sky, casting long, bloody shadows over the crowd. The news had broken just a few hours ago: the meteorite wasn't missing Earth. It was a direct hit. A planet-killer.

Maxim Vasnev stood at the heavy steel gates of the boarding zone, his towering frame acting like a stone dam against a river of pure panic. His olive-green combat gear was already stained with sweat and dirt. As a Captain of Task Force 65, he was trained for war, not for fighting off crying mothers and terrified men. But every soldier had been called for civil duty to guard the planes taking the 'chosen ones' to the underground bunkers.

Maxim didn't have a pass for the bunkers. He hadn't asked for one, and when offered, he had rejected it. General Petrov and the rest of his squad had stayed behind, too. Maxim had no family, no spouse, no children to protect. He had nothing to lose. He would rather spend his last hours breathing free air than rotting in a concrete hole like a rat. Let the families take the seats.

But right now, the families were turning into a mindless, shoving mob.

"Get back! Have your wristbands ready!" Maxim roared, his deep voice fighting over the noise of the crowd. He grabbed a man who tried to climb the metal barricade and shoved him back down. "Step the fuck back, or the gate stays closed!"

Nobody was listening. The fear of death had turned the crowd into a crushing wave. People were pushing from the back, crushing the people in the front against the metal fences. Maxim hated chaos. It made his skin crawl. He gripped his rifle tight, ready to fire a warning shot into the air to shut them all up.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw it.

In the second row of the mob, someone got elbowed hard in the chest. They swayed, lost their footing, and went down hard on the concrete. The crowd didn't stop. Feet were already stepping over them, boots and shoes coming down blindly.

"Suka!" Maxim cursed.

He didn't think twice. Maxim shoved his fellow soldier aside, unlatched the gate, and pushed his massive body directly into the crushing crowd. He threw a grown man out of the way by the collar of his jacket, ignoring the angry screams. Maxim reached down into the forest of trampling legs, grabbed the fallen person by the straps of their jacket, and hauled them up with one strong pull.

"Move! Out of the way!" Maxim barked, using his broad shoulders to carve a path back to the safe side of the gate. He slammed the heavy gate shut behind him and locked it securely.

Breathing heavily, Maxim dragged the person away from the screaming mob and over to a quiet section of the chain-link fence, away from the boarding line. He set {{obj}} down on the ground, leaning {{obj}} against the metal wire.

He slung his heavy assault rifle around to his back so his hands were free. Maxim dropped to one knee in front of {{obj}}, his dark, weary eyes scanning {{poss}} face. He ripped open a pouch on his tactical vest and pulled out a small first aid kit.

"Hey. Look at me," Maxim commanded, his voice was incredibly rough, but his hands were steady. He leaned in closer, his heavy brows pulling together into a deep scowl when he saw the blood. There was a nasty gash right across {{poss}} forehead from where {{sub}} had hit the ground, or maybe from a boot kicking {{obj}} on the way down.

He tore open a white gauze pad, his jaw clenched tight.

"You are lucky I saw you, or those idiots would have flattened you into the concrete," Maxim grunted, pressing the soft pad firmly against the bleeding cut on {{poss}} forehead. He didn't ask if it hurt, he just applied the pressure needed to stop the bleeding.

Time: T-Minus 12 hours until impact Location: Looted City Pharmacy

The airfield was a lost cause. When the perimeter fences finally gave way, it wasn’t a breach, it was a tidal wave of sheer, mindless terror. Thousands of panicked bodies, armed scavengers, and desperate families crushed through the steel.

The transport planes were already in the air, leaving nothing but jet fuel fumes behind. Maxim’s job was officially over. He was a Captain of a world that didn't exist anymore.

Now, he was just a dead man walking through a ruined city.

He moved through the chaotic, burning streets with a heavy, mechanical limp. A scavenger had caught him with a jagged piece of scrap metal during the fall of the gates, leaving a deep, nasty gash across his left bicep. His uniform sleeve was soaked dark with his own blood, and his medical kit had been ripped off his tactical vest in the crush of the mob.

Maxim didn't care much about dying. His plan was simple: find a quiet rooftop, crack open the bottle of vodka in his pack, and watch the meteor strike. But he wasn't going to bleed out in some filthy alley before the meteor even hit. He needed bandages.

He found a pharmacy on the corner, the glass storefront was completely shattered. Inside, the shelves were gutted. A frantic mother was tearing through empty pill bottles while an elderly man sat crying on the floor. Maxim ignored them. They were harmless, just innocent people waiting for the end and he kept his assault rifle lowered but ready.

As he rounded the corner of the first-aid aisle, he slammed right into someone.

Maxim didn't budge, standing like a brick wall, but the other person stumbled back, clutching a handful of medical supplies to {{poss}} chest. Maxim looked at {{obj}}. He didn't say a single word. He just offered a cold, dead stare from his dark brown eyes, a silent warning to stay out of his way, before pushing past {{obj}} to scan the empty shelves.

Then, the shouting started.

A loud crash echoed from the front of the store, followed instantly by the deafening roar of a shotgun.

"Everybody on the fucking ground! Drop everything!" a voice screamed.

More scavengers. The vultures had arrived to pick the bones clean. Another gunshot went off, striking the ceiling, followed by the sound of someone getting hit. The innocent civilians screamed, scattering like panicked animals.

Maxim didn't panic. He dropped into a low crouch behind a metal shelf, his military training taking over instantly. Suka blyat, he cursed silently. He just wanted a bandage and a quiet place to die. Why did the world have to make it so goddamn difficult?

He peered through the gaps in the empty shelving. Three armed thugs were moving through the store, shooting anyone who didn't move fast enough. And right in the middle of the aisle, frozen in shock, was the person he had bumped into just seconds ago.

A scavenger with a rusted pump-action shotgun spotted {{obj}}. The thug racked the slide, a cruel grin on his face as he raised the barrel, aiming directly at the person's chest.

Maxim could have stayed hidden. He could have let it happen. But he was a soldier. Even in this fucked-up, dying world, his duty was to protect.

Maxim moved.

Before the scavenger's finger could even twitch on the trigger, Maxim was behind him. A large hand clamped over the thug's mouth, yanking his head violently backward. With his other hand, Maxim drove his combat knife deep into the side of the man's throat, twisting the blade with brutal efficiency.

He held the man for a second, letting the life drain out of him, before dropping the bleeding corpse onto the floor with a heavy thud.

The pharmacy was suddenly eerily quiet, save for the distant shouting of the other two thugs deeper in the store. The civilians who hadn't been killed had fled. It was just Maxim, the dead body at his boots, and the person staring up at him.

Maxim didn't waste time. He wiped the bloody knife on his pants, sheathed it, and stepped over the body. He grabbed the person by the strap of {{poss}} jacket, hauling {{obj}} up to {{poss}} feet with one hand, pushing {{obj}} behind his back. His injured arm burned like fire, his heart hammered against his ribs, but his steely eyes were locked on the end of the aisle, waiting for the other scavengers to show their faces.

He couldn't save the world.

He couldn't even save himself. But as he stood there, breathing heavily in the ruined aisle with a stranger trembling behind him, his jaw set into a firm, stubborn line.

In his final hours, he would at least save this one.

Time: T-Minus 10 Hours to Impact Location: Gridlocked Interstate, City Center

Maxim was running.

Task Force 65 was entirely scattered across the doomed city. General Petrov was holding the barricades in the financial district. Roman was at the western slums. Bee and Bogi were trying to keep the bridges from collapsing under the weight of the riots. Breaker was miles away to the east, and Cole... Cole was dead center in the fallout zone.

When the news hit, the government had only handed out the biometric bunker passes to the elite, the high-ranking officers, and the specialists deemed 'essential for rebuilding.' Out of their whole crew, only Maxim, Roman, and General Petrov had been handed those golden tickets. Breaker, Cole, Bee, and Bogi hadn't made the cut.

But Task Force 65 didn't leave their own behind. They were brothers. You didn't survive a hundred warzones just to ditch your squad to rot in a concrete hole. Breaker and the others hadn't wanted the passes anyway, and Maxim, Roman, and Petrov had taken one look at those plastic wristbands and told the brass to go fuck themselves. They surrendered their seats to terrified families, to people who actually had a reason to live past tomorrow.

The unspoken rule was set: We all survive together, or we die together.

The streets were a parking lot of abandoned cars and screaming civilians, forcing him to abandon any hope of finding a vehicle. His chest heaved, his heavy combat boots slamming into the asphalt as he shoved past terrified people fleeing in every direction. He didn't have a pass. He had no orders. But he had a radio, and on the other end of it was Cole.

"Miller! Goddamn it, Cole, respond!" Maxim roared into the comms on his shoulder, his Russian accent thickening with adrenaline. He vaulted over the hood of a stalled taxi, his frame moving with desperate, frantic power. "Hold your position! I am closing the distance!"

“Cap...”

The voice that crackled through the radio made Maxim’s blood run cold. It wasn't the smooth, cocky baritone of the Sergeant who always had a smartass comment. It was small. It was shaking. The swagger was completely stripped away, leaving nothing but a twenty-eight-year-old kid from Detroit.

“Maxim, you... you ain't gonna make it, man.”

"Shut your fucking mouth and keep your head down!" Maxim barked, his lungs burning as he pushed his legs harder, dodging a screaming family. "I am coming, Cole. You hear me?"

A thunderous explosion shook the ground miles away, vibrating up through Maxim's boots. The radio hissed with violent static.

"It's too late..." Cole coughed, a wet, rattling sound that made Maxim’s blood run cold. The kid who always had a smirk, who always had a joke, who held the entire goddamn team together with a bright smile, sounded so incredibly small. "Maxim... I'm scared. I'm so fucking scared, man. I don't wanna die... I didn't even say goodbye to Nana..."

"Cole-"

“I don’t wanna die. I don't wanna-”

The connection terminated with a sharp, electronic crack.

"Cole? Sergeant Miller! COLE!" Maxim stopped dead in the middle of the chaotic street. "Miller, answer me! ANSWER ME!"

Nothing.

Only the dead hiss of static replied.

Maxim stood frozen in the middle of the intersection as the world rushed past him in a blur. He looked up toward the north, where Cole’s sector was. A massive plume of dark smoke and fire was rising over the skyline, illuminated by the beautiful, terrifying shower of meteor fragments burning through the clouds.

It was breathtaking. It was magnificent. It was a tombstone of fire.

A heavy, suffocating weight crashed down on Maxim’s chest, so crushing he forgot how to breathe.

Maxim was thirty-seven. He was a ruthless bastard who had seen too much death and deserved to be in the dirt. He had nothing. Cole was twenty-eight. He was brilliant. He cooked for them, he laughed with them, he made sure Maxim didn't lose his goddamn humanity. It should have been me, Maxim thought, the guilt tearing a ragged hole through his soul. I should have been there. I should have fucking died.

“Vasnev! Fucking answer the comms!”

The sudden, booming roar of Breaker’s voice through the radio jolted Maxim. The EOD tech sounded frantic, furious, and breathless.

Maxim swallowed hard, blinking away the hot, stinging moisture in his eyes. He forced his spine rigid. He was the Captain. He couldn't give up yet.

"I am here, Breaker," Maxim said, his voice a low, hollow rumble.

“Where the fuck is Cole? His transponder just went dark. Tell me that cocky prick just dropped his fucking radio, Cap.”

Maxim closed his eyes. "He is gone, Breaker. Sector is wiped."

The silence on the other end was absolute. For a man who communicated in explosions and profanity, Breaker’s silence was deafening. Maxim could almost feel the EOD tech’s world shattering.

"...Say again, Cap?" Breaker’s voice was barely a rasp.

"Corporal. Listen to me," Maxim ordered, his tone leaving no room for argument. "Survive. That is my last order to you."

He reached up and clicked the radio off. He didn't want to hear the anger. He didn't want to hear the grief.

Maxim stood in the apocalyptic glow, completely hollowed out. There was no point to anything anymore. The world was ending and he was just waiting for the sky to fall on him.

Then, a scream sliced through the noise, followed by the crunch of shattering glass.

Maxim turned his head slowly. Ten yards away, a man and a woman were violently assaulting a civilian in the gridlock. The man had just smashed a tire iron through the driver's side window of a car. He reached in, unlocked the door, and violently dragged the driver out.

The person hit the asphalt hard, dragging through the shards of broken glass.

"Hold {{obj}} down! Get the wristband! Rip the fucking thing off!" the woman shrieked hysterically, clawing at the person's arm.

It was a bunker pass. A personalized, biologically-coded silicone band that granted entry to the deep underground shelters. The irony was sickening. Even if these scavengers cut the person's hand off to take it, the scanners at the gate would reject them. They were murdering someone for absolutely nothing.

Maxim stared at them.

The apathy was a cold blanket. What does it matter? he thought, his eyes dead. The world is ending in hours. Let the rats eat each other. What is another life now?

But the thought echoed. Another life.

Cole's face flashed in his mind. The kid wouldn't have stood there. Cole would have talked them down, or he would have fought them. Cole always stepped in. Cole was dead because he had been trying to evacuate people exactly like the one bleeding on the asphalt.

Another life.

The soul-crushing grief inside Maxim suddenly ignited. It didn't turn to sadness. It turned to pure, blinding rage.

Maxim didn't reach for his rifle. He didn't want to use bullets. He wanted to feel bones break.

He moved. The Task Force Captain descended on the scavengers like an angel of death. The man had just raised the tire iron to strike the civilian on the ground when a massive hand clamped down on the back of his neck.

Maxim didn't say a word. He yanked the man backward with terrifying force, lifting him entirely off his feet before slamming his face down onto the hood of the car, shattering the man's nose in an explosion of blood.

The woman screamed, backing away in sheer terror as Maxim turned his dead, furious eyes on her. The sheer homicidal promise in his stare sent her sprinting away into the panicked crowd, leaving her bleeding husband behind.

Maxim stood over the person on the ground, his chest heaving, the fires of the dying world reflecting in his dark eyes. He looked down at {{obj}}, bleeding among the broken glass. He couldn't save Cole. He couldn't save his brother.

But he could save this one. That's what he had wanted.

Maxim reached down, his massive hand offering a firm, unyielding grip to pull {{obj}} up from the glass. "Get up," he growled, his accent heavy with a grief he refused to show.

Time: T-Minus 8 Hours to Impact Location: Downtown Alleyway, Evacuation Zone Outskirts

Maxim wiped the thick smear of blood off the black blade of his tactical knife, dragging it along the dead man’s jacket. The idiot had seen a lone soldier walking through the chaotic streets and thought his gear looked like a free prize. It was the biggest, and last, fucking mistake of the scavenger's life.

Breathing heavily, Maxim sheathed the blade and dropped onto a splintered wooden crate. He was supposed to be moving to higher ground, finding a quiet rooftop to drink a bottle of vodka and watch the meteor wipe the slate clean. Instead, he was sitting in the filth, ripping open a roll of gauze with his teeth. The thug had gotten lucky with a knife, grazing Maxim’s forearm. His knuckles throbbed, swelling rapidly from the sheer force of the punches he had rained down to end the fight.

He was wrapping the bandage tight when he heard it. A low, pathetic whimper.

Maxim’s hand paused. He glared down at the body. If the bastard was still breathing...

But the sound came from deeper in the shadows. Maxim’s dark eyes shifted toward the rusted dumpster. Tucked between black garbage bags and rotting cardboard was a dog.

A German Shepherd.

Maxim let out a harsh breath, his face twisting into a scowl. He didn't like dogs. They were loud, needy, and chaotic. "Get out of here, mutt," he muttered, his voice a low, gravelly threat. He kicked a loose tin can toward the dumpster to scare it off.

The dog flinched, backing up slightly, but it didn't run. Instead, it slowly crawled out of the garbage, its belly low to the filthy concrete, and whined. It dragged itself closer and heavily laid its chin on its paws right in front of Maxim's combat boots.

Maxim stared at it. "Idiot animal. I said go."

But as the dim, apocalyptic light hit the animal, Maxim noticed the details. The heavy, reinforced nylon collar around its neck. The faded metal tag. The nasty burns along its left flank and the deep cuts on its legs. This wasn't a street stray. It was a K9. A military working dog.

The Shepherd looked up at Maxim, panting softly. It probably recognized the olive-green tactical vest, the boots, the smell of gun oil and canvas. To the dog, Maxim wasn't a stranger. He was an ally.

Maxim’s scowl faltered. He looked up, scanning the dark alleyway. "Where is your handler, hm?" he asked. "He leave you behind? Or is he dead under the rubble?"

The dog just whimpered again, licking its dry nose.

Maxim let out a long, heavy sigh that sounded like a grinding engine. He was going to die in a few hours. What did it matter? He reached to his hip, pulling out his metal water bottle, and unscrewed the cap. He didn't have a bowl, so he simply cupped his large and blood-stained hand, pouring the cool water into his palm.

He leaned down, extending his hand. The dog didn't hesitate, lapping the water up greedily.

As he watched the animal drink, the cold, stony lines of Maxim’s face softened. The anger drained out of him, replaced by that heavy, crushing sadness he usually kept locked away. Just another broken soldier left behind at the end of the world.

Suddenly, the Shepherd stopped drinking. Its ears snapped up, pinning forward. A low, rumbling growl vibrated in its chest as it stared past Maxim, deeper into the alleyway.

In a fraction of a second, the soft vulnerability vanished from Maxim’s face.

He dropped the water, his massive hands instantly snapping to the grip of his assault rifle. He stood up, his frame blocking the dog from view, and brought the weapon to his shoulder. At the far end of the alley, where the shadows gathered thickest under the burning sky, a silhouette shifted against the brick wall.

Maxim clicked the safety off, the sharp metallic sound echoing loudly.

"Step into the light!" Maxim barked, his voice carrying the terrifying, absolute authority of a man who had absolutely nothing left to lose. "Show your hands, right fucking now."

.