The Deserter

by Peadar O'Guilin

  ‘I need … I need water,’ he said. His body wanted food too, yet he preferred to punish it for having betrayed him so badly. If only Tarini could see him now. Oh goddess, oh goddess. It was the revenge he’d always dreamed of on those nights when he’d been cutting himself. But it would have been better if his father had never let him escape.

  Divya dared to place a hand on his shoulder. ‘We need to go on. Unless …’

  ‘All right,’ he said. He owed Stopmouth his life. And these people too, the ones he’d murdered in his mindless rage. It would all be for nothing if he didn’t find Indrani.

  Hiresh lurched to his feet and moved on through the exclusively Religious crowds of Pride Sector in the Quiet God District.

  These were non-combatants. He could tell by their skeletal look – far worse than that of any Secular, even these days. It would have been easy for them to lunge at him as he passed, with a knife maybe. Nobody dared. They’d already done what damage they could by feeding up warriors instead of themselves for a rebellion they could never win in a world that could never last.

  Many religions had clubbed together here: he saw Roof Worshippers like his own family; Blue Warriors with dyed skin; and orange-robed Ascetic Faithfuls. Each group kept to its own part of the corridor, but all their eyes bore the same bleak resentment.

  The further the Wardens progressed, the greater the stench of unwashed bodies, the more bitter the air. Nobody spoke aloud, but they might not have been heard anyway over the never-ending coughs that sputtered from all quarters; the hacking and spitting that flecked the walls with poorly absorbed saliva. The whole corridor glistened with it, as though the sector were sweating in some special fever of its own.

  Further on, as the malfunctioning walls of Pride Sector darkened, he and his squad passed into a corridor staked out by the Veiled Mystics. Here, only the top half of a person’s face was visible, peeking between folds of filthy cloth that damped the noise of coughing.

  There was something about the eyes that bothered Hiresh and he couldn’t put his finger on it. He transmitted his concern to the squad, hoping somebody might be more observant than he was.

  They’re young, somebody sent. Young eyes.

  Stop! ordered Hiresh. He looked around, feeling a sudden chill in the stifling corridor. These aren’t non-combatants, he sent.

  He was too late. All around him, the Veiled Mystics surged to their feet and threw off their robes. Shots rang out. Divya’s laser beam turned one wall into slag as Hiresh’s squad panicked around him. A trap! He’d led them into a trap!

  Men and women ran at him with knives. He tried to throw them back, but in the press of bodies there was nowhere for them to fall. He caught a glimpse of apartment doors opening all along the corridor as more fanatics squeezed into the fray.

  He sent a panicked message to Dr Narindi. Reinforcements! Though where they might come from, he had no idea. He punched and kicked and head-butted with all the savagery he could muster. His enormous strength crunched through fragile bodies until the live ones were crushing him back against the wall with a barrier of corpses to protect them.

  He heard cries of panic from his squad, and pain and fear. ‘I give up!’ somebody shouted. ‘Oh, please!’

  The back of Hiresh’s uniform was sticking to the damp wall. All he could see was knives and hate-twisted faces. They couldn’t reach him any more than he could them, but the crush and the bad air were making it harder and harder for him to breathe.

  He saw Divya go down. They had caught her arm and forced it up where she couldn’t bring her laser to bear. They must have knifed her then, for she sank quickly. Hiresh was on his own. He was starving for a breath of poisoned air.

  The wall, it turned out, was an apartment door. Suddenly it opened behind him and he fell inside onto his back. More warriors waited within, eager for their chance to finish a real Elite, one of the very few remaining in the Roof. He felt overwhelmed by terror, more frightened than he’d been since Stopmouth had saved him from the giant alien.

  But he was stronger than they expected, and more athletic too. He rolled his entire body backwards into the room before they could fall upon him. He threw one man straight through the door into the crowd and spun round a girl coming at him with a knife. She dropped her weapon and he picked her up and held her facing the crowd.

  ‘I’ll break her neck!’ he called. ‘I mean it!’ He didn’t, of course. He couldn’t. The Chakrapani rage had already left him.

  Hiresh didn’t expect them to stop, but strangely they did. A sudden hush had fallen on the crowd, broken only by the continual coughs of this district. He realized that the sounds of gunfire had long since come to an end.

  The crowd parted to reveal a young Blue Warrior of excellent physique. A handsome boy of the last blessed generation before the Crisis. Only sores around the mouth and nose marred an otherwise perfect face.

  ‘Your Wardens are all dead,’ he said quietly.

  ‘More of us are coming,’ Hiresh told him.

  ‘We’ll kill them too.’

  ‘And me,’ said Hiresh. The youth nodded, and the Elite felt bitter laughter rising in his throat. The crowd muttered, but waited patiently. ‘All I wanted was to pass through your sector,’ he said. ‘Not for my sake … There’s somebody who can put an end to all the bad air and the shortages. I swear to you. Let me get her out and all this can end.’

  The youth shrugged. ‘We stopped believing the likes of you long ago.’ The crowd muttered approval. ‘Your only decision now’ – he pointed to the terrified girl in Hiresh’s grasp – ‘is whether you die with the karma of another butchered innocent on your soul, or whether you choose to go with dignity.’

  Hiresh shook his head. He could feel the anger rising, and struggled to put it back in its box. He knew it wouldn’t save him against such numbers. ‘Why should I choose either? The guilt would be yours and not mine. You can let her go by freeing me.’

  ‘We cannot allow an Elite to escape. Little Manju knows that, don’t you, pet?’ Hiresh felt the girl nod in his grasp, though her whole body trembled. ‘Any of us here, from the youngest up, would make the necessary sacrifice.’

  ‘Even if that sacrifice is somebody else? This girl? You will choose it for her?’

  The youth smiled sadly.

  21. THE DROWNING

  STOPMOUTH STEPPED BACK from the pool of slime, shaking his head, until he felt Indrani’s hand on his shoulder.

  ‘It’s only thirty paces across,’ she said. ‘If it’s not too deep, we could wade … And we’ve been through it before, love. It stings, that’s all.’ Her voice lacked conviction. She must have known the damage would increase the further they walked. Thirty paces would almost certainly kill the baby if she couldn’t be kept out of it. And who knew what condition the floor might be in? What hazards lay decomposing at the bottom, ready to catch their feet or trip them up? And water? More than anything, what about water? Stopmouth’s whole body was screaming out for it.

  ‘I’m going to tighten Flamehair’s sling,’ said Indrani.

  Stopmouth ignored her.

  He pressed his face against the clammy surface of the nearest wall. It vibrated ever so softly against his cheek. Had it done that before? He felt so sleepy now, all his limbs warm and achy at the same time. Stopmouth had never seen an old man when he was growing up. Hunters too weak or weary to lift a spear gave their lives and their flesh – usually willingly – for the sake of the tribe. After he’d fled his home with Indrani and discovered a new people, he’d noticed men and women with strange grey hair and wrinkled faces. He’d tried teaching a few of them to hunt and had been amazed to see their pathetic shambling attempts at running, as if their legs might give way at any moment.

  That’s me now, he realized. A drink, though. A drink will win back my strength. Just a sip. A swallow. If only I could swallow!

  ‘Stopmouth? Stopmouth!’ He felt a stinging slap across his face. ‘I’m sorry, are you all right? You looked a bit … I did
n’t want you to …’

  ‘Fine,’ he whispered. He was concentrating on staying upright. But it didn’t work out like that. Suddenly the lights dimmed and he was thrown off his feet. Indrani fell on top of him, with Flamehair wailing. The ground shook and the Roof closed off all knowledge from them. It went on and on. The hunter’s teeth shook in his jaw, and they all slid together across the floor of the corridor.

  Towards the station, the door of an apartment burst open, spewing fragments of metal and other materials he couldn’t identify. He tried counting the heartbeats that the shaking lasted, but was constantly distracted by the need to keep his family close and safe from flying debris. He felt sure that the forces around them were strong enough to smash puny human bones if the ancestors willed it.

  Eventually – although it felt like an eternity – eventually it stopped. The lights came back fully for a few heartbeats, then turned dim.

  ‘Can you understand me still?’ whispered Indrani.

  Stopmouth nodded.

  ‘We have to hurry. The next one of those …’

  ‘Yes.’ The Roof surely wouldn’t survive another day. Certainly not in this area. Soon Snake Sector would look no different to anywhere in the Upstairs. High up on the walls, light sparkled off the little droplets that were beginning to form there. Many didn’t drip straight down, but instead drifted left or right or, in one case, upwards.

  Voices were coming from the corridor at the other end of the pool. A middle-aged woman ran through the door there, her appearance dishevelled, her clothes torn. She skidded to a halt when she saw them, her mouth working.

  ‘We won’t hurt you,’ said Indrani.

  ‘I’m going into the cleared area,’ called the woman. ‘I’m going to Snake.’

  ‘No,’ said Indrani. ‘There are no cleared sectors. It’s all just propaganda. I’m sorry.’

  More people came in behind the woman. Some might have been Religious, but under the filth it was hard to tell. Four more women; a knot of men; feral children who didn’t seem to belong to any adult there.

  ‘You can’t stop me,’ screeched the woman. ‘I’m going – I’m going to the clear sector!’ Screams came from the corridors behind her.

  ‘There’s nothing here!’ shouted Indrani.

  The woman and several others surged forward into the slime. They waded through it, the woman at the front. A few paces in, a look of puzzlement crossed her face, but she didn’t slow down. Two thirds of the way across, her teeth were clenched, and she emitted a faint whine. She shrieked once, floundering and splashing in the heavy liquid around her. Those behind her did the same thing, their wails rising in a chorus of terror. Stopmouth leaned out towards her over the edge of the pool, but he didn’t even reach the tips of her fingers before her knees gave way and she sank. Most of those who’d come into the pool with her followed her under the surface too, but it didn’t put off others who were only now entering the room. They came forward in a frightened wave, while Indrani begged them to stop. The hunter helped the tiny minority of half-dead survivors over the edge. They lay panting around his family, too tired to crawl any further, their skin eaten away to the bloody flesh beneath.

  ‘You’re wasting your time!’ cried Indrani. ‘It’s a desert over here!’ The wails of those who were sinking and dying drowned her out. Dozens of other people tried their luck, pushing floating bodies out of their way, or clambering over them, until the hazards at the bottom of the pool drastically cut down the successful crossings.

  In the end, a few dozen Religious milled around on the far side, unable to get up the courage to run across; even less willing to turn back to whatever horrors they’d fled. Indrani had fallen to her knees at the edge of the rising ooze.

  Stopmouth stepped up beside her and laid a hand on her shoulder. ‘Get up,’ he croaked. ‘I need you to talk to them.’

  ‘Who?’ she muttered.

  He pointed across at the people on the far side. For most of his life he’d been poor at speech, his stutter a never-ending source of fun to other boys and some of the adults too. He’d become adept at gestures. Now that thirst had turned the inside of his mouth to old fur, he needed them again.

  He showed Indrani the Wardens’ rope he still carried around his waist and mimed holding it under strain. Then he pointed back at the men and women on the far side.

  ‘It can’t work!’ she said, but already she was rising. She pulled him close and kissed him deeply. He felt the sting on his peeling lips and a growing determination that he would not fail her, that he’d get her to the far side.

  ‘You there!’ she called. ‘Listen to me, if you want to cross! Listen!’

  Many were still panicking and wouldn’t shut up, but others stilled them, sometimes brutally, with punches.

  ‘We want to get over there and you want to be here,’ she stated.

  ‘You’re mad!’ said a big man on the far side. ‘The demon’s coming. If you’re as Religious as you look you’ll want to be staying there, believe me.’

  Indrani didn’t tell him about the lack of water. Stopmouth felt bad about that, but made no effort to alter what she was saying. She clutched Flamehair tightly to her chest. She had but one loyalty now, one tribe. These others were only beasts: their skins for clothing, their skulls for plates.

  ‘We’re going to throw you a rope. My husband is strong enough to hold one end by himself. Your men will take the other. I will climb across. Then some of you can come here. Enough to support my husband when he crosses. When we’re all on that side, we’ll hold the rope for anyone else who wants to go. Agreed?’

  There were a few frightened arguments that Stopmouth didn’t listen to, distracted as he was by his own overwhelming thirst. But he bucked up when he heard Indrani saying, ‘All we ask in exchange is that you give us water. If any of you have bottles, throw them over here now, or it’s all off.’

  ‘Indrani!’ he whispered. ‘You can’t! They’ll die in Snake with nothing to drink. You know it!’

  She spared him a glance, but all he saw was the cold eyes of the Tribe, choosing volunteers so that the rest might live. It was an idea he’d grown up with and knew to be right. Yet volunteers always understood why they’d been chosen. They too were raised with the same customs and accepted them. No deception took place.

  ‘They are not beasts,’ he said.

  ‘They are not my child,’ she replied. ‘They are not my man.’ She touched a hand to his face, and now he saw the turmoil that hid beneath her cold façade. The sight of her doubt made him feel better.

  Moments later a ten of bottles flew across the pool. Half landed in slime, but the others fell around Stopmouth, and his qualms dropped away in a madness of thirst. He’d heard it said that a hunter deprived of water shouldn’t drink too much. But his body with its Medicine was different. He swallowed three full bottles, while Indrani wiped his face, and then went back for more. She took little herself, for all that she must have needed it.

  Indrani stroked the muscle on his shoulders and ran a hand down one arm. ‘You’re so strong, my love,’ she said. ‘But you’re going to need an anchor for all that weight.’ She pointed to a heavy piece of furniture half poking through the door of an apartment. ‘You might want to tie yourself to that bed.’

  He nodded. The fog had started clearing from his mind, at last. It was amazing what those nanos could do. He was beginning to understand how these people had become so dependent on them.

  They tied some empty bottles to one end of the rope and flung it across to those who waited for it. More people had arrived in the meantime and anxiety was growing. In the distance, great cracking noises echoed down corridors, and once the floor shuddered so much, the hunter thought they were having another quake, the one that would end everything.

  He was glad that Indrani would be the first across. He wasn’t sure how long the patience of the refugees would hold out.

  ‘Now,’ she said to him. ‘I’m leaving you Flamehair.’

  ‘No!’
His voice was already stronger than it had been. ‘No! What if … What if—?’

  ‘You’ll wear her on your back, like I do. I know what’s going through your oh-so-noble savage mind and I won’t have it.’ She gripped his shoulder. ‘You’re not staying behind. I need you with me. Both of you. We’re Tribe. All three. Or none. And remember the plan! I can’t capture the warship without you.’

  Five strong men took up the strain at the far end. Family men, he saw. Desperate to get their people to safety. He felt renewed guilt, but swallowed it.

  Indrani gripped the magic rope and began to climb across, upside down. It gave a little under her, seeming to stretch so that her bottom almost touched the rising surface of the slime. He felt the strain of her weight across his shoulders, but the bed he was anchored to carried most of it. The men on the far side had only themselves, and their faces creased under the unaccustomed effort.

  Bodies floated beneath Indrani, already eaten away, while on Stopmouth’s back, Flamehair wailed for her mother.

  ‘All right, little one,’ he said. ‘All right.’

  An explosion came from the far corridor. People cried out, and new refugees rushed in, calling out in panic. What are we getting ourselves into? Stopmouth wondered.

  The other men’s concentration seemed to slip and the rope dipped so that Indrani’s hanging robes trailed in the slime.

  ‘Get me up!’ she cried. And they did. They steadied themselves. She pulled herself forward another few paces. Only ten steps from safety remained! Only ten!

  A sharp green light that Stopmouth had seen once before lit up the far corridor. The man who’d hunted him on the surface, Varaha, had carried a weapon that could do such a thing.

  ‘He’s coming!’ somebody cried. ‘The demon is coming!’

  The men didn’t drop the rope. They grimaced, and one of them opened his mouth, perhaps to call out. It didn’t matter. Everybody surged forward towards the slime at once and knocked those faithful men over.