We crossed the border into hell just before dawn.
I had expected a desert. I had expected sand and wind. But the Deadlands were not empty. They were a graveyard of industry.
The convoy rolled slowly over a road made of cracked asphalt and crushed bone. On either side of us, the skeletons of massive factories rose into the smog-choked sky. Smokestacks, long dead, stood like tombstones. Rusted pipelines snaked across the ground like the veins of a giant, metal corpse.
The air here didn't just smell bad; it tasted wrong. It tasted like copper and sulfur. Like chewing on a battery.
"Roll up the windows," Caleb ordered over the radio, his voice tight. "Filters on max. Do not breathe this air if you can help it."
I pressed the button on the dashboard. The heavy glass slid up, sealing
