by E S Richards
She hoped with all her might that Asher would develop some form of low-level mutation in the next couple of weeks and would not be branded a Zero on his tenth birthday – hence making him be hunted for the rest of his life. She knew it had to happen fast as time was rapidly running out before his Turning Age Ceremony would occur. She hoped and prayed for this so strongly, as she knew the troubles of being a Zero very personally herself. Zahyra was a pure human, a phrase she still liked to use in the privacy of her own head, as she believed she accounted for much more than just a Zero. In public she pretended to be a Gen 1, and told her friends that her mutation was that she could see more detailed colours than other people, something that was very difficult to prove but also very easily accepted, as it was a common enough mutation.
Her mother had also managed to help her escape her Turning Age Ceremony, where ten year olds were branded on their right arms with a number reflecting what level of mutation they carried. This ceremony was carried out even in the smallest camps, with the elders believing they had to continue doing it in order to protect the many, rather than the few. On the day of her Turning Age Ceremony, Zahyra had faked an elaborate sickness, and was deemed unable to attend the ceremony. Then in secret later that night, her mother had branded Zahyra herself, as a One instead of a Zero. A few more tales from her mother to the various elders in charge of the camp and luckily enough everyone soon believed Zahyra was Gen 1, with a small and effectively useless mutation.
Although her branding had been one of the most painful experiences of her life, Zahyra was eternally grateful for what her mother had done for her. Conducting the branding away from the official ceremony meant no pain relief was available to her, so Zahyra had to endure the red-hot sting of the number one, as it was incorrectly burned into her skin for life. This pain however, was certainly worth it in Zahyra’s mind, and her mother’s too. The Gen 1 symbol allowed her to be free from the rogue mutants who roamed the wastelands, picking off Zeros merely for fun or for sport.
Zahyra’s mother was a Gen 2, while her father had been a Gen 1 – not that she remembered much of him anymore. She’d often asked questions about why her father had left, but they only resulted in her mother breaking down into tears, or becoming silent and downcast for days on end, so she quickly stopped in her quest for answers. There seemed to be no rational reason why Zahyra had been born without a mutation. Her mother said she was special, but Zahyra saw it as more of a curse, knowing she could never be her true self around anyone but her mother. She even had decided to keep the truth from Asher, just in case he accidentally revealed her secret one day.
If her secret got out, she would likely not only be executed by more developed mutants, but would also be severely punished by any elders of her respective camp at that time for misleading those around her. Effectively, Zahyra had no choice but keep her identity secret from everyone. She went about her life pretending she could see incredible colours in things other people couldn’t, often spinning stories of what things looked like to her or making up new words for colours other people couldn’t see.
This was why Zahyra prayed that Asher would develop some form of mutation, and quickly too. His young age would only keep him safe for a few more short weeks and then if he was branded a Zero, the rest of their lives would be spent in hiding, never knowing if they were completely safe or not. Unless she could find a way to give him a fake branding, but without her mother by her side, Zahyra knew that was near enough impossible to achieve.
It was at this point her little brother twitched against her arm where he’d been sleeping since they boarded the bus, his face scrunching up into a frown. He must be having a bad dream Zahyra thought, and with the intention of saving her younger brother from any further suffering for the time being at least, she leant down and gently nudged him awake.
Chapter 2
“Asher,” Zahyra whispered, “come on, wake up buddy.”
Her little brother stirred against her, opening first one of his dark brown eyes and then the other. Blinking in the darkness before his sister’s face came into focus in front of him. Asher was a sweet kid, as said everyone who met him. He had short, dark curly hair just like his sister, which bounced up and down with the movements of the bus. He was also very small for a nine year old and could never even hurt a fly, further assuring those who knew him that it was likely he turn out to be a Gen 1 – or as Zahyra feared, a secret Zero like herself. What stood out about Asher was his intelligence, or more his knowledge regarding how to deal with difficult situations, which shone out as far beyond his years.
Both Zahyra and their mother had worried about what would happen to Asher without a male role model, since he had never even known his father. This was apparent in some regards, relating to his timid nature and lack of aggression, but aside from that Asher had not been affected by it much at all. What he lacked in typical male aggression, he made up for in intelligence and often Zahyra was strong enough for the both of them anyway. The only downside to his intelligence was that he was often too shy to speak up amongst crowds of people he didn’t know, so sadly his genius was sometimes forgotten about.
Remarkably it was Asher’s idea to build a new wall in their camp when wild dogs kept getting in at night. Asher had suggested it to his mother and sister beforehand over dinner, and they had encouraged him to put it to the elders the next day. He realised that by building another wall to the eastern side of the camp, the scents from the camp were more obstructed, and less obviously upwind from the dogs resting grounds. This resulted in many less attacks and break in’s from the wild dogs, and the entire camp had congratulated Asher on his idea. Something that not even the elders had thought to do.
It was for reasons like this, and other bright ideas that young Asher had, that Zahyra and her mother knew he was special and both believed he would develop some form of mutation relating to his intelligence. Zahyra just hoped that this would materialise into something more obvious soon, as there was really very little time left for Asher to be safe. His intelligence, Zahyra knew, could only help him so far in the outside world.
“Hey Zar,” he muttered, then glanced around the bus a little, his face dropping when he remembered for sure where they were and what had happened.
“Hey, don’t worry little man,” Zahyra stroked Asher’s bushy mop of hair with her left hand, “we’re gunna be fine. This bus is taking us straight to the safe haven, and mum will meet us there, remember?”
Asher nodded to his elder sister and tried to give her one of his bravest smiles, but Zahyra could tell he was petrified. Who could blame him? No one could be sure where they were going. The promise of the safe haven was alluring, but they didn’t know how long it would take to get there, or what would be waiting for them when they arrived.
Asher nestled back into the crook of his sisters arm and Zahyra continued to stroke his head until he fell back to sleep. She had to be even stronger now, for the both of them, until they were reunited with their mother at least.
Back in the silence of the bus, Zahyra’s thoughts started to drift to her father. She had known him for six years before his disappearance, which had taken both her and her mother by complete surprise. For most of those six years the three of them had travelled from camp to camp, her father apparently searching for something. It was very soon after they settled in the camp Zahyra had spent the following ten years in that her mother fell pregnant. She could still remember how happy she had been.
Her father had seemed excited too, from what she could remember. They’d spent many evenings sitting around their little fire, her mother and father drinking tea and discussing different names they could call the baby. It was actually Zahyra’s idea to call him Asher – if it was a boy – inspired by the ash clouds that blew up from their fire, dancing and twirling around in the wind in front of them. She’d been so pleased with herself when he was born and she found out that he was in fact going to be named Asher.
Zahyra thought it was about a week aft
er Asher was born that her father left. It could have been earlier or later though, her memories from that time weren’t too certain. She did know that Asher was still very young, and her mother wasn’t completely recovered from childbirth, so it can’t have been too long after. One of her last memories of her father involved them all sitting around the fire again, with Asher cradled in her mother’s arms. Zahyra was watching the ash clouds dance in the wind, laughing about them with her father, who was playfully trying to catch the ash and bring it back down to earth for her. Whenever Zahyra thought of that memory an involuntary smile couldn’t help but creep across her face, the four of them all together.
When she woke the next morning, her father was gone. For days her mother didn’t say a word, and Zahyra and Asher were taken into a neighbouring hut by some of the camp elders, whilst some of her mother’s friends stayed in their hut trying to console her. Zahyra wasn’t clear on the timeline around then for she had still been very young herself, but eventually her mother got better and Asher and Zahyra moved back in with her. She didn’t ask about why her father had gone, or indeed where he had gone to until a few years later, but her mother just shook her head and looked away. Zahyra tried to find answers again and again as the years went on, but her mother never gave her the response she was hoping for.
By now, Zahyra had almost completely given up on her father, and never expected to see him again. Even if he had survived the Gen 3, Gen 4 or even Gen 5 mutants outside the walls of the camp, she would likely never meet him again. Besides, she was almost certain she didn’t want to, especially after all the pain and tears he had put her mother through. She had Asher, and her mother would meet them again soon, that was certainly enough for her.
Shaking her head to forget about the painful memories surrounding her father’s departure, Zahyra returned her gaze out of the window. The moon had found a gap in the clouds now and she could see it glancing off the nearby mountains, creating strange shaped shadows that seemed to dance in the sand. She sighed at the ruined land around her, for she knew from pictures she’d seen in books that it had once all been so beautiful. Every city was home to buildings taller than the trees, all made from shining metals or bright red brickwork. Now everything was destroyed and lay crumbled into a heap, and the only new buildings that were built were made from wood and mud.
Nature had begun to reclaim the earth, with grass and weeds growing in the most urban cultures, snaking their way around buildings and blossoming on rooftops and windowsills. Where there had once been well-kept grass was now a jungle of waist high tendrils, each moving in the wind with a mind of their own. Zahyra loved the way that nature was beginning to reclaim control of everything, but she also longed for the safety and security the high-rise buildings had offered, the way she’d seen it in pictures or read about it in old books. She longed for a simple and easy life, one where she didn’t have to hide who she truly was or pretend to be something different. A life unfortunately, that she knew she could now never have, especially she thought – returning to the present – if Asher was doomed to be a Zero like her.
Resigning to her fate she rested her head against the old window next to her, and tried to catch a few precious hours of sleep. With Asher quietly snoring next to her, she mirrored his breathing, watching the dancing shadows in the distance and willing for sleep to come, for dreams to take her mind away from the cruel reality she was living in and allow her a few moments of blissful ignorance.
However, the longer Zahyra sat watching the shadows in the distance, the more she became confused by what was making them. Originally she had thought the mountains in the distance created them, but from watching she could see they were moving and changing, all in unison, as if getting closer to her. She readjusted herself slightly in her seat, being careful not to wake her little brother sleeping next to her and squinted into the distance, trying to figure out what they were. It was then with a gasp she realised they were other vehicles, all driving in a beeline towards the bus she was on. Zahyra instantly knew that having access to vehicles was a very rare thing these days, and aside from the bus she was on right now, she’d only ever heard of one other group having the power to run them: mutants. Generation 4 and 5 mutants.
Zahyra sat stunned into silence for a long minute, breathing very deeply, unable to process what was happening. Undoubtedly the mutants were heading for her bus, whether they knew it was full of children or not they were committed to attempting a raid, and Zahyra had the feeling that once they were committed to something, they weren’t going to stop. Once she’d finally overcome the initial shock of the situation, she knew she had to take action in some respect, albeit there being very little she could do from inside the targeted bus. Slowly she edged away from Asher, leaving him sleeping across the two seats they had shared and made her way to the front of the bus.
“Um, excuse me?” she quietly said to the bus driver. He was a bald headed Gen 1, as she could see from the branding on his right arm, which was blended in nicely to a collection of snake tattoos. Zahyra had realised that many of the lower ranking males tended to have a lot of tattoos on their right arms, probably in order to slightly disguise their ranking and help them save face if they came up against any more aggressive males. As the bus was driving in almost complete darkness, save for one broken headlight and the intermittent moonlight that crept out from the clouds – allowing Zahyra to watch the shadows of the mutants following them – she thought he must have some sort of mutation involving his vision, making him able to see clearly in the dark or something. Night vision was as common a mutation as her pretend advanced colour vision and she knew a few people from her old camp that had developed it.
“What is it?” he replied in a gruff voice, clearly slightly irritated by being interrupted from whatever thoughts were meandering around his head during the journey.
“I think we’re being followed,” Zahyra said nervously, indicating to the shadows she’d been watching with a look over her shoulder. The bus driver, Grayson as his nametag said, took one hand off the wheel and looked in the direction Zahyra indicated. He must have had advanced eyesight as she had believed because it only took him half a second until his eyes widened and he drew in a sharp intake of breath.
“Are they…?” Zahyra trailed off, almost unable to ask the question she knew she’d receive a positive answer to. Not that she needed confirmation of what she already thought to be true, even with her regular eyesight, there was no mistaking a gang of wild mutants on the hunt.
“Better get back to your seat kid,” Grayson said, nodding to Zahyra, “and put on a belt if any of them still work, I’m gunna have to try and lose them.”
Zahyra crept back to her seat, relieved to see one of the seat belts still intact and – as she gave it a tug – functioning. Holding the seat belt out with her left hand she softly pushed Asher along the seat so he was next to the window where she’d been sat, and then fastened the belt around his sleeping body. The seat Asher had previously inhabited had no belt, so Zahyra simply sat down and held onto the seat in front of her, praying Grayson could get them out of this.
However before she’d even managed to finish her quiet little prayer, she knew there was close to no hope for them. Everything surrounding them was barren desert land, with the only cover for miles being the mountains directly behind where the mutant convoy was coming from. The bus was guaranteed to be leaving tracks in the sand, so their route, so matter where they went, would be easily mapped out for the mutants to follow. Plus, she was on a shuttle bus, averaging what couldn’t be more than 50mph. Whereas the convoy the mutants had seemed to consist of motorcycles leading the charge and then several SUVs bringing up the rear – sooner or later, they were going to capture them.
Sitting on the edge of her seat Zahyra knew almost indubitably that they were going to be captured, and she had about ten minutes to try and make up a plan that would get her and Asher out in the best way possible. Sadly everything she’d heard about what happened to chi
ldren when they were captured by advanced mutants was all formed from imaginary stories the other children in the camp she’d lived in had told in order to try and scare one another on dark nights. She had absolutely no clue what was going to happen, or even if they were going to survive this. Her mother and the other elders rarely spoke about high-level mutants, with the theory being if the children didn’t know about what the mutants did it couldn’t hurt them – although at that moment in time Zahyra wished she knew so she could at least be a little more prepared.
Suddenly, when the thought of survival flashed through her mind, Zahyra looked down at Asher, still sleeping soundly next to her. Should she wake him up or not? On the one hand, if he managed to sleep through everything he would be saved another nightmare like the one he’d just experienced, but she knew the likelihood of that happening was close to nil. Even if he slept through the initial attack, there was no chance the mutants would let him sleep whilst they made their decisions… what decisions they would have to make Zahyra did not know, but she assumed there must be some sort of selective process.
She would show herself to be strong, demonstrating the muscles she had built up over the years and assure them she would be a hard worker in whatever regard they needed. Asher, she could claim was still under ten years old, and could still develop a mutation to label him as a Gen 3 or above. Here she would have to lie and pretend he had violent tendencies, otherwise they would never anticipate him developing into anything above Gen 1. Between them they could claim Asher had a strong mental mutation, which was why he had such a small build, but could still become a fearsome mutant. With this plan in place, Zahyra knew it wasn’t much, but it was the best she could come up with. Now she had to wake Asher and let him know what was about to happen, how his world was about to be turned upside down for the second time in under a day.
