by Michael Bray
“Got a name?”
The Collector shook his head.
“No name, eh? Very strange.” The old man rubbed his chin, his eyes glimmering in the gloom. “Well, my name’s McCarthy.”
He held out a gnarled hand. The Collector looked at it, confused and unsure what to do.
“Never done a handshake, eh?” McCarthy chuckled and lowered his hand back to his lap. “Yeah, the world ain’t what it used to be that’s for sure.”
“What was it like before?”
McCarthy considered the question. He closed his eyes, pale tongue flicking side to side as he licked his lips. “Well, it was fuller, that’s for sure. Lots of people, lots of noise. Everyone trying to scheme and steal, beg and borrow. It was a filthy, violent place until the event happened.”
The Collector nodded. Everyone had different explanations of the event, but nobody knew for sure what it was or how it happened. All that was certain was the absolute devastation left behind. “What was it like?”
“The event?”
The Collector nodded. McCarthy didn’t answer. He struggled to open a can of beans, his arthritic hands making hard work of the can opener. “Sorry, the ol’ hands don’t work so good anymore.” He handed the can to the Collector, who took it but didn’t eat.
“Well, go right ahead,” McCarthy said, handing over a grubby spoon. “I’ve already eaten today.”
Trust was now a secondary thing to hunger. He ate the beans, juice dribbling into his beard as the old man watched, a wry smile on his face. “You enjoy that now. No need to rush.”
He changed position and drummed a spindly finger on his leg. “So, you want to know about the event, eh?”
The Collector nodded.
“Well, truth is, nobody knows what it was. I doubt anyone will ever find out now anyways. I suppose all those who might know about it are long dead by now. All I can tell you is my experience of it.”
McCarthy stared off into the distance, recalling old memories. “We had no warning. Nobody knew anythin’ about it till it happened. I used to have a farm, a few fields, and cattle. We made our livin’ on the livestock. We had the best-bred cows in the area, and soon as they went to slaughter, demand was high. Anyways, this one day I was out in the back field, preparin’ for the harvest. I hear a noise. At first, I think it’s a plane or something. Then it turns into a high-pitched whine. Real loud, real intense. My wife, Vivian, God rest her soul, had come to the door, soap suds on her hands. She looked at me, I looked at her, and then we both looked to the sky.”
He cleared his throat, bottom lip trembling as he recalled it.
“There was a white flash. Real bright. Lit up the sky and stayed that way for days, then that smell, that burnin’ smell that is everywhere now drifted to us on the wind.”
“What happened then?”
McCarthy looked at the ground. “Everyone died. My wife fell down at the door. My neighbour, Franklin, had been ploughing his field in the big red harvester he had. He slumped forward at the controls, the harvester rolling to a halt. Even that wasn’t the worst.”
“What happened?” the Collector said, food forgotten, a spoonful of beans held halfway to his mouth.
“The animals,” McCarthy said. “My dog, Patch, made this god-awful noise and collapsed down, dead. Then the birds came. Like little black bullets as far as the eye could see, falling out of the sky, struck down in mid-flight by the event. I saw a plane go down, commercial jet. I guess the pilots were killed by whatever the hell the event was. It speared towards the ground, rotating over and over in slow circles. I didn’t see the impact, but I did see the fireball.”
“A man told me a few years ago that it was a bomb.”
McCarthy shook his head. “I don’t know what it was, but I know what it wasn’t, and let me tell you, it wasn’t no bomb. There was no noise, no explosion. Just that flash, that smell, then everything died. First the people, then the plants and the trees, the grasses. Whatever happened sterilised this place. Why we didn’t die with the rest, I don’t know though.”
McCarthy sat reflective as the Collector continued to eat his beans. Neither of them spoke for a while. When the Collector had finished, he put the spoon inside the empty can and set it at his feet. “How do I get to the ocean?”
McCarthy frowned. “Well, I’m not so sure you should be goin’ there at all, truth be known. Nothin’ to do with me of course, just sayin’ I wouldn’t go there.”
“Why?”
“Because it ain’t like your picture no more, that’s why,” McCarthy snapped, then stood quickly, striding to the door and staring out into the dead world beyond. “I’m sorry about that,” he said quietly, “but I don’t like to think about it too much…but, it seems if you’re insistin’ on going there, I should warn you to be careful. If you want to go look, then that’s fine, no problem with that. But if you plan to go out there…” The old man turned and looked at the Collector, old eyes tired and filled with partially forgotten fear. “Well, maybe I wouldn’t do that. Wait here, I want to show you somethin’.”
McCarthy hobbled into the darkness of the church. The Collector waited while he scratched around in an old chest of junk. He came back with a large bundle wrapped in rags. He sat down, setting the bundle across his knees. It was large and bulky. The Collector looked at it, then at McCarthy. The old man’s face was tense and devoid of emotion.
“I saw a man ten years ago on the road about, maybe, a hundred miles from here,” McCarthy said. “He was walking, his clothes all covered in dry blood. His arm was a mess. It had been cut, shredded, actually, and the infection had set in. Flies had already laid eggs in it, and his rotten skin was already full of maggots. Anyways, he begs me to help him, says he needs medical supplies. ‘Course, anyone who looked at that arm would know it was beyond savin’, but you couldn’t say that. Wasn’t my place to. I had a good place then, a little house tucked away from anyone who might be lookin’. I told the guy I’d do my best to fix him up. I cleaned the arm, put some bandages on it. Nothing that could actually help him, ye understand. But it made him feel better. Anyways, he readies to leave, and he says he wants to give me somethin’ to say thanks for helpin’ him. He opens his bag and takes this out.”
McCarthy patted the large bundle of rags on his lap. The old man stared at the Collector, one bony hand still on the bundle. “Says he took it from somethin’ he found washed up on the beach. I asked him what it was, but he just handed me this, said I should have it. He said he couldn’t give me anything of value, cos’ he didn’t have anythin’ on him. He said he could give me this information though, and said I should keep it in mind if ever I thought about going out on the ocean.”
“What is it?” the Collector asked, unable to take his eyes off the bundle.
“No words can describe it. Best I just show ye.”
McCarthy unwrapped the bundle, his movements slow and careful. The Collector leaned closer, looking at the object within.
“What is it?” he asked.
“That’s a tooth, son.”
The Collector glanced at McCarthy, then back at the object, unable to comprehend what he was looking at.
It was around eleven inches long, and curved to a dagger-tip point. It was white and looked brittle. Towards the thickest end, a huge blackish root, which was the size of both of the Collector’s fists together. Mesmerised, he reached out to touch it.
“Careful, son,” McCarthy said. “See the edges? Serrated.”
The Collector withdrew his hand, and looked closer at the tooth, noting that, exactly as McCarthy has said, the edges of the tooth were still incredibly sharp.
“That thing would slice your skin to the bone. Very sharp. Very dangerous.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” the Collector mumbled, unable to take his eyes from the tooth.
“Nobody has, or at least, not that I know of. But that man swore to me the thing this had come from, the rotten carcass he found washed up on the sand, was huge.
He said it was enough to stop him ever wanting to go in the water ever again. He said even though it was rotten and stinkin’, the corpse on the beach was huge. I mean, hell, you only have to look at this tooth to know that.”
“But what is it? I mean, what is it from?”
McCarthy hesitated, watching the Collector for what felt to him like very long time.
“Who knows,” he shrugged, wrapping the tooth again. “All I know is what I told you. Maybe it’s something that evolved after the event. Something new, something nobody has ever seen before.”
“What happened to the man?”
McCarthy shrugged. “I fixed him up and he and I parted ways. I never saw him again. I like to think he made it, but based on that arm wound, I reckon he’s almost definitely dead now.”
The Collector nodded as McCarthy set the wrapped tooth on the floor beside him. “What about you, son?” he said. “What’s your next move?”
“I don’t know. I’ll just keep going.”
McCarthy nodded again, those sharp eyes probing. “You know, you could stay here. There’s plenty of room, plus I have food. I could use a strong kid like you to help fix up the place.”
“No, thanks, I need to keep moving.”
“For what? There ain’t nothin’ out there, just look at it.”
The Collector looked over his shoulder to the square of light showing the outside world. Brown, and barren, lead skies adding to the gloom.
“It’s a damn wasteland out there, son, like in the movies.”
“Movies? What are they?”
McCarthy half smiled in the gloom. “Well, back before the event, people called actors made films, uh, shows for people to watch. They pretended to be other people, some of them were good at it. Others, not so much. It was quite a big business.”
The Collector frowned, and McCarthy’s grin widened. “Well, I guess it all sounds stupid to someone like you who has only ever known this world like it is. Pity. I reckon you would have enjoyed it.”
The Collector stood, eyes flicking to the wrapped tooth by McCarthy’s chair. “I have to go.”
“You don’t have to rush off yet. Stay a while. It’s a lonely world out there.”
“I can’t, I have to move on.”
“Why? There ain’t nothing there, I already told you.”
The Collector had no answer. He didn’t know why, all he knew was that he had to go. There was no choice. He felt compelled to keep moving, to find something that both made sense and justified his existence in the world. “Thanks for the food,” he said, then walked towards the door.
“Now wait just a second.” McCarthy said, standing and retreating back into the dark. The Collector waited, listening to the old man scratch around in the dark. He came back with five silver cans.
“Here,” he said handing the cans over. “At least take these with you. Just beans, nothin’ fancy, but its food.”
“Thank you,” the Collector said, shrugging out of his backpack and putting the cans inside. “Are you sure you have enough?”
“Wouldn’t have given you them if I didn’t, now would I?”
“Thanks,” the Collector grumbled, unsure how to handle the old man’s kindness.
“Which way you goin’?”
The Collector looked out of the door. Every direction looked much the same. Desolate. Cold. Dead. He shrugged. “Not sure.”
“Don’t give me that bull,” McCarthy grunted. “You’re still lookin’ for the ocean, ain’t ye?”
The Collector didn’t answer. He just looked at McCarthy, not wanting to lie to someone who had been so generous. The old man flicked his head to the left. “That way. Keep walking and in maybe, five or six days, you’ll find what you’re looking for.”
“Thanks,” the Collector said, stepping out into the stinking, dull day. “For everything.”
“Now you listen,” McCarthy said, following the Collector outside. “You’ll be safe to stay on the road for maybe a day or so, but as soon as you reach the outskirts of the next town, you get off it, you hear me? You stick to the side roads, make sure you keep low. Actually, wait a second.”
He retreated back inside the broken church. The Collector waited, listening to the dull sounds of him rummaging around. He came back, red-faced and out of breath. “Here.”
He handed the Collector a tattered, taped-together map. It had been drawn on by McCarthy over the years and was almost falling apart.
“That red dot is here, where we are no,” the old man said, pointing at the red blob on the map. “You’re facin’ that way, down the road.” He traced a line with his finger down the road on the map. “See here, where this red X is?”
The Collector nodded.
“That’s where you need to get off the road. There’s a marker there, three cars stacked on top of each other right across the right side of the road. There, you’ll see a dirt road to the left leadin’ into the trees. You wanna take that road. It takes a bit longer, but you at least avoid them.”
“Who?”
“Bad people, son. Bad people. See this town?”
He pointed to a small cluster of buildings beyond the red X on the map. “Bad place, bad people. I’ve heard all kinds of stories about what they do to people, stuff I don’t want to go into now. All you need to know is that my way is safer. Look.”
He moved his finger back to the X and traced a smaller line which cut off to the right. “See?” he said as he drew his finger through the woods marked on the fragile paper and out of the other side beyond the town. “You go my way, you avoid them and get to live a little longer. Once you’re past the town, re-join the road and go maybe, another ten miles or so, and you should see the ocean. Whatever you do, keep your eyes open. You can never be too careful, especially where strangers are concerned.”
The Collector looked at the map, then back to McCarthy. “Did you make this?”
The old man chuckled. “Not me, my hands don’t work so good like I said. My brother made it. We found the map, we just made our own markings on it back when we were like you and thought there might be somethin’ out there still to find.”
“You have a brother?”
McCarthy’s brow furrowed, and he looked at the floor. “Not anymore. Not since Gerry found that damn town, which is why I’m advising you to keep away from it. He didn’t and paid the price for it. Got himself killed.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I am too. Be safe, son. Even though it’s not as full as it once was, there are still some bad, bad people in this world.”
“Thank you, for everything,” the Collector said, hopping off the stoop, his feet kicking up a cloud of dust. He paused, staring down the endless pencil line of road which melted into the distance. He glanced at McCarthy, nodded and set off on his way.
INTERLUDE TWO
THE BEAST WITHIN
I saw it.
I saw it rise out of the ocean, a behemoth, a monstrous thing that had no place even in this broken world.
AMALGAMATION
It might have once been shark, or whale, or octopus at one time, but not anymore, now it’s something new. Something merged together by the event. Like candle wax melting, so its flesh is bonded together creating something new. How it lives is a mystery. All I know is that I looked into its black eyes and saw death.
It came towards the boat, quivering and lurching, somehow propelling its unnatural form through the water. My men and I could only stand there and stare at the horrific and somehow beautiful scale of the beast as it passed beneath our boat. Silently, as if one man, we crossed from the port side to the starboard, so we could continue to watch as it went on its way. In all my years on the ocean, never have I seen such a thing. I knew then, as we raced for shore, that the ocean is no longer a place for man. I promised myself after that day I would never again venture onto the oceans and instead find my sustenance elsewhere.
IN THE FLESH
The flesh of man, those who scavenge and haunt these broken lands
. It is in them that we will find our sustenance. Why should we, the strong, venture out onto the oceans and face such deadly beasts, when the weak are so plentiful and easy to harvest? Is this not our only option? Our crops are dead and animals spoiled and extinct. Only man remains.
NATURAL SELECTION
The strong survive and the weak falter. This has been the way through all history.
ONLY THE STRONG
We shall take them and harvest them like cattle. We shall pack them into cages and fatten them. This will not be done with cruelty, but to ensure survival for we, the strong.
REJOICE IN THE FLESH!
Meat, glorious meat. A thigh, a rump, a rack of ribs roasted over an open fire. Enough to make one salivate, enough to make a man forget the horrors he has seen in the ocean.
I met another man who encountered the same thing as I. He spoke of his boat being capsized, his crew taken by one of those awful creatures from the deepest pit of hell. He spoke of the ocean bubbling as if on fire, a pool of boiling chaos from which the hellish beast was spewed. Thirty feet of it he said, and I believe him. The dimensions of the one I saw was comparable in scale. I wish the man and I could have conversed for longer, but there are bellies to be filled and he was weak.
VITALITY
The surge in energy, the renewed vigour from the taste of fresh meat is irreplaceable. One of our number is a butcher, and he showed us how to make the most of the meat, how to ensure nothing was wasted or left that could be used. I asked our chef how he had sweetened the meat so, and he replied that it was nothing he had done. I wonder if perhaps fear led to that delightful sweetness. With belly full and body rested, our thoughts turn to our next feed. People are becoming thinner and thinner spread, and as such, our new food source may become harder to find.
TRUST
That is the key. People as a rule are trusting. We should use this to our advantage. It would, I think be quite simple. An offer of shelter, a promise of warmth and food, all things that the people of the new world need in order to function. They will come to us, and we will never need to hunt again.
