The Society Series Box Set 2

by Mason Sabre

  James … her husband, her best friend and the only thing that still made sense in this new world wiped at his brow. He let the sack go, and Diana caught it before potatoes covered their kitchen floor. She couldn’t help but laugh at him and give into the light flutter in her stomach as she watched him. “I guess we’re on potato salad for the foreseeable future.”

  She wasn’t exaggerating either. She not had time to pull off enough sacks from the roll before James dragged in another two bags.

  “We'll be at this all night.” She didn’t mind this so much. It felt good, it felt right. They were doing something for the community that had taken them in and given them so much, this … even if it was potatoes, was their way of paying it back. Whatever was spare could be prepared and frozen. Winter-time, food was always a little scarce, fresh produce even more so.

  “You have enough ration sacks?”

  She pulled off a few more. "I think so." Ever since they had moved to the small town of Newport, James had made it his mission to be self-sufficient and have the land feed them. He loved living off the land, but never in her dreams had she imagined they would grow enough to fill the people of the town too. It was great, though. It meant no one had to rely on scavenger hunts and pick through the crap the Humans threw away. Although that had been a lot less in recent months. James believed it was down to the revolt—The Forgotten—a band of people who had come together and gone against the Humans. "Flush everyone out." That was what James said. Like, kill off the shit from the edges. Except it wasn't working that way. Towns like theirs suffered for it, and they had done nothing wrong.

  Last year, James had grown a whole crop of green beans. He'd even grown a full line of bell peppers, but this … these potatoes, so many potatoes. It was a relief, though. When the time came to plant again, he'd planted green beans, and they hadn't taken. He'd tried squash, more peppers, carrots, it didn't matter what he tried, always a week later, nothing. Just seeds that had died and shrivelled up. These potatoes were their last hope, and who cared if they were eating a baked potato for the next month? It was food.

  That morning, when they had woken, and the reminder on the calendar called for James to check the gardens, he’d been like a child at Christmas. Diana laughed at him. He’d jumped out of bed and fallen down the stairs to get outside.

  “Why are you laughing again?” he asked her, as he came in with another two bags. They kept the hessian sacks for the harvest. They were much sturdier. Worked better for being able to harvest and drag. But they had found an old ream of carrier bags from one supermarket that had closed. They were the right size to fill up with portions of food for the people of the town.

  “You,” she said.

  He shot her a wink and then went back outside, whistling as he went. Finn, their Golden Retriever, lay out on the deck, basking in the sunlight that came into their garden at this side in the morning. He flopped his tail. Too comfy to get up and join in the banter.

  “If I divide these bags into four and then dish them out, that’s forty bags. I think everyone in town will become a potato at this rate.”

  “Well, they don’t have to eat them.”

  There weren’t many left in the town now. When James and Diana had first moved there, almost seven years ago, the place had been bursting with people … but people moved on, died, left; whatever the reasons, the town had dwindled down to just them and a few others.

  She and James considered themselves lucky. They had snagged the old barn house and turned it into their own. It had an upstairs now, which it didn’t when they first took it over, but James had built it. Together they had made it into a home. It was small and quaint, but that suited her. It was their home, and she loved it. They made a lot of the furniture from old things they had restored after hunting through old houses. The very table the potatoes were on, had been marked and stained when she got it, but a good sanding down and a lick of paint, and it held a kind of character for the place.

  “Another two after this,” James said. “I’m melting.” He wiped the back of his hand across his forehead, wiping away the sweat. “It'll be a bursting day today. I swear.”

  "Well, you can rest after. You've earnt it."

  “Rest? No way. I’m going to plant more things. We’ve a few weeks left, and that soil is ready.”

  “Don’t you need to fertilise it?”

  “It’ll be fine.” He leant over and kissed her on the cheek and before going back for the rest, tapped her bottom, and she slapped his arm.

  There were five full families left in the town. Six, if she included her and James in that and seven if she added the old couple who lived a few steps down from where they did, Jane and Jeff. They were pushing eighty, or at least, that was what Diana could guess. Jeff was as fit as a fiddle if you asked him, but Jane … she was giving into the ailments of old age. It would be lucky if Jane were around this time next year although she had made it this far. Jane and Jeff were both Witches although neither of them had any magic left. That was the thing with Witches. The magic came with a limited supply, and when it ran out, game over. They could refill it. Diana wasn't a Witch, so she didn't know how that worked and she was too polite to ask.

  "There are forty bags here," Diana said when James had finished. If we give every family five bags, we will have plenty spare, if anyone needs them.

  “I’m sure that’ll be handy. Plus, if anyone new comes to town.” That was James’ dream. Make this place somewhere nice and have it filled up again with people, but no one new had come in a long time. The numbers had gone down, not up. And every time someone had left, Diana had watched the sadness in James’ face. He never mentioned it. "I think I'll plant beets or beans in the soil. They grow fast, and even if we only get half of them taking, it's better than nothing." He motioned to the bags. "I'd put Jane and Jeff's potatoes in storage too. Or at least make them up and cook and freeze them for them. They've a microwave. They can defrost whatever it is you do."

  Diana smiled and popped a kiss on his cheek. “You’re a good man, James.”

  “Yeah? Remember that when you’re busting your arse with all this cooking.” She yelped when he grabbed her and pulled her to him.

  “You stink.”

  "I know." He kissed her and made it so she pressed to his entire sweaty body. She tried to writhe away, but he chuckled against her lips.

  “James …” she squealed.

  He no sooner had her in his arms, when they both jumped at the sound of a loud crash outside, followed by someone yelling.

  “What was that?”

  “I don’t know. Stay here.” He grabbed for the pitchfork he'd rested by the back door, and he was out of sight in a second.

  Diana went to follow him, but then her stomach clenched with the reminder of what use would she be to him? He was a Necromancer, she was an Angel. She was stronger than he was, but her wings … her useless mortal wings meant that she could do nothing—she was nothing. Every incident like this, every moment that needed her to fight, all she could do was feel the weight of her failure.

  Shouts and screams echoed through to where she was. A gut-wrenching cry scraped along her soul and pulled her out of the depths of her self-pity.

  “I can help, can’t I?” she said. She’d have said it to Finn, but even he had charged off with James and into the direction of the sounds.

  At the back of their house, James had cornered off part of the garden for growing things, which left them a small path between the house and the garden. It meant people could come and collect their produce when it was ready. The small gate leading to the outside swung from where James and Finn had raced out. Diana followed.

  Feet … she saw feet first, someone sprawled out in the middle of the road, one foot with no shoe and the other, covered in mud and dirt. One of the Sanders’ girls stood over James, crying. She wore a small t-shirt, and blood stained down one side.

  “Please … help her. Oh, God, help her.”

  Someone had hold of Stacey Sa
nders, holding her shoulders and keeping her back so James could work. James knelt on the ground beside the other girl, Michelle.

  “What happened?”

  "Taggers. Go get my kit from the bedroom," he said, without glancing back at Diana. He had taken his shirt off, and it was under Michelle's head, a pillow to cushion the back of her skull from the hard ground. Her face beaten, her lips swollen, her eyes closed, and blood oozed into her hair. Her face looked more like a slab of meat than anything else.

  Others from the town stood around, ashen faces of shock, horror and a whole load of what the fuck, staring. Rachel, Brian, Rory … so many faces all gathered together, hands clasped, breaths held. Diana nodded at James, the only one who seemed calm and collected enough to do anything.

  But then he was seven years out of the military—seven years, her fault, but he said it was his choice every time she raised it. Seven years in a world that still seemed so alien for both, but at least he had settled in well. So well Diana struggled to keep up with him, but she tried.

  He stored the medical kit in their bedroom at the bottom of his wardrobe. It was his old kit from his military days, and a lot of it was stolen from the laboratory where he had worked. Not that he was a scientist, no, but he was an enforcer.

  The bag weighed so much, but she still slung it onto her back and took it out to him. The medical kit wasn’t the only thing he had stolen that day … but unlike the bag, he couldn’t hide her in the wardrobe. They had to hope no one came by and found her.

  She dropped the bag by his side and opened it for him. “What do you need?”

  "My stitching kit, and tweezers. Bloody tagging bastards." Michelle's hand lay across his leg, and blood oozed out from an inch-wide gap in her flesh. Someone had got water and cloths, and they had cleaned Michelle's face a little. Not that it made much of a difference. The swelling and bruising still made her face a horrific mess.

  At least Stacey had calmed. She knelt by her sister, crying, stroking Michelle’s hair.

  “I need to remove the tag.”

  A man ran towards them. Nathan. He lived in the house closest to the main gates to the town, just him and his son. His wife had died only a few months back. "Where's Max?" he asked, giving Michelle a once over. "Where's Max?" he stepped in closer, his eyes on Stacey. "Where is my son?"

  Stacey put her hand to her mouth, and her shoulders shook as she cried again.

  "Stacey … where is Max?" Nathan pushed. He moved between the other people, so he could get to the girl. "Where is he?"

  She raised bright red eyes at him. Her entire body quaked with her upset. "We w-were. The taggers.”

  He shook his head at her and then grabbed her shoulders. “Where is Max?” he demanded, to the point of almost shaking the girl. “Where is he?”

  “Nathan …” Another man put a hand on Nathan to ease him away from the weeping girl.

  “No.” he tried to shrug him off. “Where is my son? My son? Where is he? Tell me …”

  The man kept hold of Nathan, keeping him from shaking the young girl for her answer, but her mother, Liz, made Stacey face her. “Where’s Max, sweetheart? Tell us where Max is.”

  Stacey hiccupped with her upset, trying to gulp in air to steady herself. "He … we … the taggers. I …" she cried so hard her face turned red, and she clutched at her face between the words as if she was trying to pull them out. She stared towards Nathan and just seeing his face seemed to make her cry even harder. She wailed and sagged against her mother's hold. "The river," she whispered out. "He's at the river."

  Nathan ground his jaw so hard that his temple pulsed. “Is he dead?” he asked her, fixing her straight with his gaze. “Is my son dead?”

  They didn’t need anything else. Stacey crumpled into her mother’s arms, her legs unable to hold her upright anymore as she gave into the pain of it all.

  “Nathan …” Diana said. “I …”

  He heaved in a breath. “My son is dead.”

  Chapter 2

  James cleaned Michelle up. Her swollen face would take time to heal. She'd needed stitches too, just below her hairline, and someone had broken her arm. All of that would repair itself with time. The wound James couldn't fix, Diana was afraid, was that of the loss of Max, their friend. Beaten and battered to death in front of them. It was the classic thing to do. Take out the biggest threat first. And they had, but Max had been a child, a child to Diana at least. In that stage between boy and man.

  Jeff had donated one of Jane’s sleeping pills to help Stacey sleep. It would be a long time before either of those girls got themselves into a good state again.

  Tagging was the newest thing with Humans. A way to keep track of all Others—a digital ball and chain shoved into their wrists, like a dog with a microchip. Unlike chipping a pet, tagging wasn't voluntary. One could get it done by choice, or have it imparted to them with force. Either way, the tag was getting implanted into the arm.

  Diana stared out to the main road of their town ... their always quiet town. They had heard about tagging and what it entailed, but this was the first time it had got so close to their doors. The Humans were sweeping through Exile like a cyclone. Both Michelle and Stacey had tags in their wrists, and the tags exploded if removed. It wouldn't kill either girl, but they would lose their hand for sure.

  It made Diana rub at her own, unmarked wrist. She knew she'd end up with a tag one day, and when the time came, her life would be over. One sweep of her DNA and they'd have the woman who had escaped the Human Project—the first Human Project.

  “It looks like he gave a good fight,” James said, as he slipped an arm around Diana’s waist and nuzzled his face into her neck. God, she loved him. She leant back into him … her wall, her strength.

  “They all did.”

  "They shot him with a tranquilliser first. It was still sticking out of his leg."

  She shook her head. Cowards. It was one thing to beat someone who was putting up a fight, but to take the life after they were out … that was just … she couldn’t think of the word. She was thankful just then for how lucky she was to have James … James, who protected her always.

  “Nathan is wrapping his body.”

  “Is anyone helping?”

  “He didn’t want it.”

  Bodies got wrapped in sheets stuffed with papers, and anything that would hold the flames. Others didn't get the luxury of a funeral or even a nice box to be cremated in. No. They got the baker's slab—a piece of stone, laid out in the farthest corner of any town, so the stench of burning flesh didn't waft across the people. Not that it mattered.

  An old cart rolled by them, big and bulky. Nathan had his head up, his eyes fixed on the road ahead of him as he pushed his son on the cart. All wrapped and ready to go. Just the mere sight of it tugged at Diana's heart, and while she didn't know what it was like to lose someone like that … couldn't imagine it, a piece of her soul joined him in the mourning of Max.

  The children of the town were the children of all. Stacey, Michelle, and Max, they were all part of the future … whatever future they would have now.

  “Looks like he’s ready to send him off.”

  Diana slipped her hand into James', and he gave her a reassuring squeeze. It'll be okay, it said, but she knew, it wouldn't. Not now. The town would differ from what it had before. It would have fear, anguish, and loss.

  Nathan leant against his son’s body. He pressed a hand into the fabric and gripped it. There were no tears yet, no cries or sobs. Diana wouldn’t have blamed him if he’d dropped to the ground and beaten it with his bare fists. The worst part of it all, Humans would not be brought to justice for this. No one, other than the Others, would deem this as wrong.

  Everyone stayed silent, giving Nathan his moment, and if he were to kneel at his son's side and just lie against him for an hour, then they would all wait. They would wait because it was what they could do for him. There was no way to bring Max back, and Humans might not allow Others to have a proper burial, b
ut they could do this. They could mourn with him, honour him and show him they were there to help him with his grief. Daft Humans and their beliefs that burying Others in the earth would somehow poison it with mutations and abominations.

  Would it ever stop, though? That was what Diana wondered as she watched Nathan. Seven months ago, someone had taken down one of the main facilities—Benjamin Norton and his nephew, leaders of the Humans in Exile … questionable Humans. They called Others animals, yet they had been the people to use children in experiments, and now they had run … run and gone into hiding because someone had said enough. She took a breath.

  “You okay?” James whispered.

  A nod. “Just thinking.” The empathic part of her wanted to go to Nathan and ease his pain, but her angelic abilities were lost to her. One of her kind could have come to him. If she hadn’t had her wings clipped, she’d have been able to ease his agony with a simple touch.

  It was almost a relief when Nathan pushed himself up, the man who had once stood so tall bowed his head and held himself together. He didn't look at anyone or say anything as he stepped back from his son, and that was okay. Every family did this their own way. Some gave speeches, some read poems, one person had even sung to his wife, but silence worked too. One of the townspeople handed Nathan a lighter.

  "Here," James said, stepping in, and offering Nathan the rope that worked as a wick. It wound into the wrappings and was covered in fuel. Something that would make it burn faster, harder. Bodies took a good hour and a half to burn if they were average size. That was an hour and a half of inhaling the scent of death. Using fuel sped it all up.

  “Thank you,” Nathan said. James nodded to him, and Nathan nodded back, and then he flicked the roller on the lighter, raised it to the end of the rope and lit it.

  The flame ran along the rope like a yellow bullet of light, and when it reached the body, it burst in all directions, devouring Max like flame-filled wings. Diana let out a breath she hadn’t realised she had been holding, and she went towards Nathan. Fifteen years … that was all Max was. Fifteen years old, and his life was done.