by T. C. Edge
Before long, the dried mud protecting my hands is starting to crack and peel, opening up little slits through which my soft skin is visible. Immediately, as I lower my hands back into the green mist to lift myself over the trunk of a tree, I feel the caustic burning of the acid on my flesh.
It sizzles and burns worse than any acid rain I’ve ever had to contend with. I flinch in pain and heave my hand out of the swampy fog, the exposed skin already red and starting to blister.
I thrust my hands into my pockets to defend them, working slower now to carefully climb my way onwards along the uneven woodland floor. When a new obstacle comes my way - a collection of stringy branches that writhe and coil across the path ahead – I have no choice but to either find a way round or use my hands.
My initial attempts to step through with only my feet prove fruitless. And with my hands locked in my pockets, I’m only likely to topple over and descend right down into the burning green cloud hovering below my waist.
So I withdraw my hands, and struggle through, accepting the pain whenever a freshly exposed portion of skin gets attacked. Gritting my teeth, I try not to gasp too loudly at the sudden stabs of pain, still concerned that I might attract one of the many strange beasts that the rumours speak of.
After an agonising few minutes, I’ve managed to work my way through. I look to my hands and grimace at the litter of burning blisters that cover them. They sizzle and sting, calling for the relief of cold water, or one of the palliative healing lotions Mrs Carmichael keeps in her quarters.
The best I can manage is to reach out to the overhanging leaves, still cool and damp in the morning air, and press them to the sores to try to soothe them. They have little impact, but do serve to stick to the mud and lesions on my skin, offering a little extra protection from the gas.
Turning the pain from my mind, I carefully place my hands back into my pockets and work my way on. The trees begin to grow a little thinner, the way ahead stretching out before me. Peering forward more intently now, I hurry my step, the proximity to the High Tower suggesting that the perimeter wall must be close.
Then, through the trees, I see a clearing. My step quickens, the pain across my hands subsiding as the adrenaline starts to pump. Cantering forward now, I hurdle over roots and branches, the light at the edge of the forest growing brighter.
I reach the final trunks and come to a stop, keeping myself hidden behind the largest tree I can find. From its back, I peer around the side and set my eyes on the open ground ahead, the mist hovering around it lighter than here in the woods.
Standing on the edge of the forest, the boundary wall comes into view ahead, just to the left. Tall and built from grey stone, it looks impenetrable, and too high to climb. I arch my neck a little further from cover and the gate appears; the southern gate giving passage to the outer districts of the southern quarter.
I look closer and see guards on top of it. They stand inside little watchtowers on either side, pulse rifles fixed to their shoulders as they gaze out.
I wonder: why the need for such security? Who exactly are they protecting the city from? The beasts in the woods? The Shadows of the outerlands? If they even exist…
Right now, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that the gate isn’t going to give me a way in. And by the looks of things, neither is the wall. Not here, at least, where there are too many eyes.
I creep back a little, melting into the darkness, musing on my next move.
I could move west a little, search the external wall in some hope of finding a weak point? Either that or try to dash across the clearing and into the woods on the other side, and hope that the wall further east is less heavily guarded.
Either way, I’m not sure it matters. One way or another, I have to find a spot where I can get back into Outer Haven unseen…
A sudden noise grips at me, tearing my mind right back into the woods.
I go suddenly still, and listen closely. It came from the left, a little way into the woods closer to the city. I set my eyes to the source, my breath caught in my lungs. And then, it comes again.
A voice.
No, voices.
Quiet, whispering, slightly distorted. And the creeping of feet, crunching gently over twigs.
I immediately react, stepping backwards, going deeper. They’re close, hidden by the foliage, but drawing near.
I move more quickly. I have no choice. Turning, I duck low and grimace hard as I enter the putrid smog, creeping along amid the shroud.
Working my way back to where I came from, I hear the voices again. They talk quietly, but casually, one raspy and the other deep, clear enough through the gas masks they wear.
“This is a waste of time,” says the croaky voice. It’s close, only a dozen metres away, moving towards me.
I duck lower, disappearing to my hands and knees. Once more, the poison begins to nip at my exposed skin, the already tender blisters being besieged. I bite down hard on my bottom lip to keep from making a sound, every fibre of my body tensing.
The next voice speaks.
“It’s just procedure. You know what they’re like…they don’t enjoy loose ends.”
“Well, loose ends don’t stay loose for long out here,” scratches the raspy voice again. “There are loads of ways that they get tied. If that girl got out here alive, she’s not anymore. You can be sure of that.”
They’re looking for someone. For me…
I crawl further back, moving into some low shrubbery. Through the shroud, the shape of two shadows appears, metres away now. One towers above the other, his heavy feet digging deep as he moves through the trees.
A Brute. And another Enhanced. They must be City Guards…
The smaller man speaks again.
“And you know, if she was out here, I’m sure I’d be able to smell her…”
He’s a Sniffer.
The Brute laughs.
“Yeah, sure, with all this fog about. No chance.”
The Sniffer shrugs, offering no retort.
“Maybe you’re right. I can’t exactly do much with this gas mask on. I don’t even know why they bothered sending me. Or you…you can hardly fit through the trees!”
The Brute lifts a heavy arm in a threatening fashion. The Sniffer merely chuckles.
“Hmmmm, maybe you’re right,” admits the Brute. “Let’s do one last check, then go back. You head off east. I’ll check around here. Meet by the car in 15 minutes.”
“Sounds good to me.”
The Sniffer moves off, and I sink lower beneath the murk. His silhouette fades into the background, leaving only the looming shadow of the Brute above me. He twists on the spot, sending his eyes in all directions, before turning right at me.
No…
He takes a step, covering twice the ground of a normal man, his frame clearing through the mist as he comes. I refuse to breathe, and skulk a little deeper, keeping as low to the ground as possible.
A crack sounds behind me, my shin pressing on a dried up old root. I freeze in the sludge and inch my eyes up.
The Brute has stopped moving too.
He stands, mist flowing around his thighs, his body blanketed in black armour and his face hidden behind a mask.
For a second, he doesn’t move. He just stands there, listening. I pray for him to move off, to stride away on those long, powerful legs of his.
He doesn’t. He strides right at me instead.
I have no choice.
I jump from the shroud and try to run. I go about half a foot before being caught. Around my ankle, a huge hand wraps up tight, pulling me back and lifting me up high.
I’m tossed upside down, my body swung into the air with consummate ease. I prepare to scream, but no sound escapes me. Instead, I merely hang there as the giant peers at me through his visor.
I know there’s no point in struggling. Not against such a beast.
And all I can think is: game over.
55
I hang in the air, my hood slip
ping off my head and my matted hair dangling down like old vines.
The Brute continues to look at me, lifting me a little higher so that we’re face to face. Through his visor, I see his eyes staring, a little frown crinkling on top of them.
“Well, look what we have here,” he says.
I gather what strength I have for a vain attempt at an escape. One that I’m fully aware will be entirely unsuccessful.
I try anyway, reaching up suddenly and gripping at his fingers. I pull as hard as I can in an attempt to dislodge them, to free up my leg for a daring getaway.
They barely budge. Perhaps a few millimetres, nothing more.
I writhe a few times like a snake, sending my aching brain rocking about inside my skull. The Brute merely holds me, apparently mildly amused by my efforts, before lowering me back into the smog.
Keeping his hands on me, he twists me around so that I’m standing straight, then pulls my wrists together and binds them tight with cuffs.
“There we go, much better,” he says.
I give up the escape attempts, and stand up straight before him. The top of his head reaches skyward, way beyond the green swamp below. Up there, where the air is clearer, his face comes into view, mostly hidden behind his mask but partially visible through his visor.
I stare at the space between his forehead and the top of his nose, focusing on his eyes. Something familiar sticks out, causing me to peer more closely.
“You’re one of them are you?” comes his voice, muted and altered slightly by his mask.
Yet there’s some familiar about that too. A tone, a pitch that rings a bell in the back of my head.
I don’t answer his question, but continue to stare.
“Yeah, you must be one of them,” he continues. “Only Hawks stare like that. What else are you? You got Bat blood? Nah, you’d have heard us coming. I’d say you’re a Dasher but you’d have run away. Gotta be a Sniffer. But a hybrid for sure…”
I let him speak, let his words fill my ears, listening closely as I rack my aching head. And then, it comes to me. His eyes and his voice join, and a memory forms.
“I know you,” I whisper.
He recoils, cocking his head a little to one side.
“Is that right?”
“You were at the bachelor ball,” I say. “Only last week. I met you there…”
He goes silent for a moment, and then slowly leans down, arching his mighty back until his face is close to my level. Now it’s he who looks at me, who examines me, staring into my eyes as I did his.
Then, a whisper creeps from his cavernous mouth.
“Brie? Brie Melrose?”
He reaches out with his fingers, and grips my mask with a lightness you would never expect from a man of such proportions. Slowly, he pulls it down to my neck, revealing my face, muddied in places but clearly recognisable.
I take a breath so as not to suck in any poison, and let him inspect me for a second. Then, quickly, he slides the mask back up.
“Brie…it is you. What on earth are you doing out here?!”
His voice in a harsh whisper. I watch as his eyes widen suddenly and he turns to look east, off in the direction of his partner. He’s not visible now, far off searching through another part of the forest.
“It was you they found in the underlands last night?” he questions. “You jumped into the river?”
I nod.
“You need to help me. Please…”
I take a shot. When I met this man at the bachelor ball, he told me he’d come specifically to meet me. That he was impressed with how I acted after the first attack by the Fanatics, and how courageous he thought I was.
Maybe he’s more like Rycard. Maybe he’s even one of the sympathisers of the Nameless like Adryan told me about. Or maybe he’s just a good man, willing to do the right thing.
“Help you?” he asks. “You need to explain yourself. What were you doing down beneath the city last night?”
“I…I can’t explain. Please, if you take me in, they’ll take me straight to the REEF. I can’t go there. Please…”
“Brie, I have orders. You must understand that. Maybe if you tell me what you were doing, I could talk to someone, but…”
“No. You can’t talk to anyone. No one can know I was here.”
My voice pleads, galloping from my throat. The pity in his eyes is evident. I continue to work on it, lies quickly forming in my head.
“I was just…just down there by the waterfall,” I say. “I like it down there, it’s calming. A load of Con-Cops came from nowhere, and they didn’t give me a chance to speak. I didn’t know what was going on. I thought they were going to shoot me. So…so I jumped in the river. It was just instinct, I didn’t know what I was doing.”
As I rattle on, spewing the fake story, he rests a mighty paw on my shoulder.
“OK, calm down…don’t get too worked up.”
I suck in some long breaths.
“So, you were just down in the underlands?” he asks. “You do know the Nameless operate down there, right?”
I shake my head like a child caught doing something they shouldn’t.
“I didn’t. I found a secret door in one of the shelters one night, during a storm. I was curious – I’ve always been curious – so I went down the tunnel. That’s when I found the waterfall. It was so beautiful, so wild. I didn’t think I was doing anything wrong…”
“I see. And last night, you just jumped in the river? You didn’t try to explain what was going on?”
I shake my head hurriedly.
“They didn’t give me a chance. I was scared…they just came out of nowhere with their guns. I panicked and jumped in.”
“And the river took you all the way out here?”
I nod.
“I woke up this morning, and was trying to make my way back…”
“Convenient you’re wearing a gas mask then.”
“Oh…not convenient,” I say, thinking fast. “Just smart. I always carry one around with me in case I get caught in the mist. I’ve worked a lot around the outer districts. It’s a habit I’ve picked up.”
He nods, seemingly buying into my tale.
“Yes, that is something the workers from the perimeter districts do.”
Really? I had no idea…
I keep my eyes under a deep frown. Let tears begin to gather in their corners. Through the most pathetic expression I can manage, I stare up into his colossal face, and offer a final plea.
“If you take me in, no one will let me explain, or even understand. You work for the City Guard…you know that they take people to the REEF for just about anything. Please…please don’t let me die for this.”
I can see him softening. He falls silent once more, his lips pressed together, and looks again to the east.
“I have my duty to attend to, Brie…”
“Please. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to become a Con-Cop.”
The tears drift from my bloodshot eyes. I can’t tell if I’m overplaying it or not. Right now, I can hardly look like the courageous girl he thought I was.
I stiffen myself, and grit my teeth, steadying my gaze on his. His large, soft eyes examine me closely, perhaps trying to figure out if I’m telling the truth. So far, I think I’ve been fairly convincing.
Then, he begins to nod.
“It’s a shame,” he says. “A shame that you’re right. If I take you in, you won’t get a chance to defend yourself, even with my testimony. I’ve worked for the City Guard long enough to know that.”
He smiles, his ample cheeks building behind his visor.
“And you know, I think the city has enough Con-Cops as it is. They’re swarming all over the place these days.”
He reaches around my back as he speaks, and I feel my cuffs clicking off. My hands swing back around in front of me, burnt and blistered.
“Those look painful,” he winces. “You’ll need medical attention when you get back.”
He straigh
tens himself up to his fullest height again, looking back east.
“My partner will be heading back to the car in a few minutes. We don’t have much time.”
“You’re helping me?” I whisper, barely believing it.
He nods.
“I’m sworn to protect the citizens of this city. And that includes people being sent to the REEF for no good reason. Frankly, as you say, that happens far too often. Now keep low and follow me. I’ll get you back across the wall…”
I launch myself at him. I can’t help it. My sizzling hands wrap around him as far as they can go, gripping to nothing but black armour.
“Thank you,” I whisper. “I won’t ever forget this.”
“You helped save lives in Culture Corner. It’s only fair that someone saves yours. Now come, my partner will be returning soon…”
He turns and begins moving through the forest in the direction of the city walls. As he goes, his gigantic frame leaves a trail in the fog, the green smoke swishing and swirling about in his wake.
I slip in beside him, staying low and keeping a lookout for any movement. Hidden beneath the fog and his shadow, we soon reach the outskirts of the forest, the city wall waiting ahead across a clearing.
And there, parked in the dirt on the edge of the trees, I see a car of the City Guard, sturdily built and large enough to accommodate a man of his size.
“Stay here a second,” he says.
He marches across the short gap to the vehicle, and opens up the trunk. For a few moments, he fiddles about, before turning once again to look in every direction.
Then his eyes come to me, and he nods for me to move.
I rush across into the clearing, leaving the dense fog, and join him at the back of the car.
“Get in,” he says.
I look inside and note that he’s fashioned a little space for me. Boxes and tools and various items of clothing have been pushed to one side. I jump in, and shuffle right to the back.
Lifting a large coat, he covers the little space I cower in, hiding my body and leaving only my face visible.
For a moment, he looks at me with a measure of curiosity once again, before slipping the jacket over my face, locking me in the shadows.
