The Dark Wild

by Piers Torday

  The women filling their buckets put them down. ‘Wolf!’ they say. And like the word is being carried along on the breeze, it passes from mouth to mouth – to the men selling sunglasses, the half-naked children, the families trailing luggage behind them in the dust.

  Until the slow-moving band of drifters comes to a halt, a hundred eyes staring at us. Hungry, hollow eyes. And drawing in like a sea rolling on to the shore, a crowd of pointed fingers and raised weapons. Sticks, lengths of pipe, broken umbrellas. I never realized piles of rubbish could be so dangerous.

  ‘Wolf! Wolf!’

  The wolf in question raises his hackles and growls, but he could take out one or two at most before he fell under a barrage of sticks and piping. We press ourselves against the mountain of rubbish, leaning against a filthy old sofa, the springs bouncing out.

  The General is on my head. *Ha! Call that an army!* he sneers at the angry faces taking step after step towards us, till I can smell the sweat, see the hunger carved into their faces. *My cockroach legions would scatter them in an instant.*

  But his cockroach legions are not here now.

  I stand in front of the cub, arms outspread. ‘No!’ I say.

  The crowd just comes closer, sandals scuffling in the dust. A thin arm swings out with a metal pole, and as I swerve out of the way, the wolf-cub pulls back, tight against the sofa. We have no more room to run.

  The wolf-cub crouches, ready to leap –

  Clockface raises the length of wood in his hand, a rusty nail sticking out the front –

  Then, with a click, he disappears. The dirty old sofa swings back, like a door opening. As it does, we fall back with it, out of the sunlight, away from the crowd – and into the mountain of rubbish.

  PART 2: WASTE TOWN

  As the sofa swings shut behind us, the wolf-cub and I pick ourselves up off a floor of uneven planks. We seem to be in some kind of tunnel, lit only by the faint glimmer of old traffic lights, slung along the sides at intervals.

  The General tramps about in my hair, his antennae quivering. *It’s a good thing I manoeuvred us into position by a secret door,* he mutters, *or that could have ended rather badly.*

  But something tells me it hasn’t ended. In fact, it’s only just beginning. Because following the line of traffic lights down, I can see a fierce glow at the end of the tunnel.

  We are inside a mountain of rubbish, right at the edge of the city. My dad and my wild feel very far away. The hungry mob outside still feels very near. I have no idea what we’re going to find at the end of this tunnel – but none of that matters. I am here for my best friend and the Iris.

  I have to find her – and it – before Stone comes back for my wild.

  We edge slowly down the planks, towards the glow. It’s shining out from clouds of bare bulbs and fluorescent strips dangling on wires from a ceiling far above, filling the space with light.

  They appear to be hanging from a huge dome hollowed out right inside the mountain. You would have no idea it existed from the outside. The ceiling looks like it’s made from old mattresses and car doors, the walls stretched tight with tarpaulin, only just holding all the rubbish in.

  A tower of scaffolding poles and rough planks stands in the centre of this dome, black rubber coils dangling over the top, like the creepers in our garden. But these creepers are connected, to row after row of electric silver bikes on the ground, pulsing away.

  The wolf-cub is at my side, panting like an old steam train after running all this way. The cockroach leaps from my hair on to his back, his antennae quivering with excitement as he sniffs the rubbish around and above us. The smell is not as bad as you would imagine, but enough to make me cough and my eyes water.

  *I never thought such a paradise existed,* the General says to himself in wonder.

  Crouching low, in case I’m spotted, I follow the wolf-cub through the bike ranks towards the tower. He sniffs each machine suspiciously as we pass. *The trail grows stronger,* he says. I feel the fingerless glove, scrunched tight in my pocket.

  At the foot of the tower, he leaps on to one of the low scaffolding platforms and I follow him up, scrambling from level to level like we’re in a video game.

  Each level is loaded up with different things – salvaged computers, wires sticking out of their open backs, or music players and headphones slung over iron bars. There is a platform with a mound of handbags threatening to topple over at any moment, next to boxes of jewelled necklaces and watches.

  Piles and piles of expensive stuff. And I bet it’s not meant to be here.

  As we reach the last but one level, stacked full of fridges still in their wrapping – I motion to the wolf-cub to wait. Standing on one of the fridges, I peer cautiously over the edge of the top floor.

  The domed space echoes with noise, coming from dozens of kids sitting on recycled car seats and deckchairs, gazing up at screens in front of them, each one speaking into a headset. Overlooking the gang from the other end, an ultrascreen four times the size of ours, filled with pictures that change every second.

  In one corner of the screen, Coby Cott mouths silently in front of pictures of the Amsguard. The rest of the display shows CCTV pictures of the crowd outside, still waving their bars and planks, looking for the wolf they just missed. Then the white ramp road. The bridge and the Culdee Sack we just came from.

  It’s like these kids can see through Facto’s cameras. They must have seen us enter the city, the battle of the Culdee Sack … Everything. No wonder they didn’t miss a helicopter landing in our garden.

  ‘That’s right, not much we don’t see,’ says a voice. Two booted feet appear right in front of me. A bare hand reaches down. ‘You got something of mine, I think.’

  By my side the cub crouches low and silent, which means he is not in a mood to be messed with. *Why don’t you let me take her now, Wildness?* he growls. *This child will be no match for me.’

  *For once, Wolf, I think you’re right.*

  He needs no more encouragement and bounds over the platform, jumping straight on to the girl, pinning her down with his claws.

  But Aida just sighs. I see the same look on her face as when she saw the stag. More like disgust than fear. ‘What you setting this stinking thing on me for? You crazy? Call him off, now.’

  ‘No.’ I say in the firmest voice I can manage. She’s the one living in a rubbish heap. Nobody’s going anywhere until I get some answers. About Polly. About the Iris. And who those crazies are outside.

  Wolf-Cub sniffs her face. He could tear it off in an instant, but she only yells up from the floor, ‘You better get him under control, you understand? We not frightened of animals, not like them Facto idiots. But we got rules too, you’ll see. And rule number one – you our prisoner now.’

  Her gaze flicks behind us for a second. Turning round, I see Eric and 123 pointing electric prods right at my head.

  *And that, I’m afraid,* says the General, *is what they call a pincer movement. Trust me, I should know.*

  For a moment I look at the two boys, then back at Aida and at the wolf-cub crouched over her. Then, with a sigh, I call him off, and they lower their prods.

  *The she-child was not afraid of me,* he mumbles, retreating back to me with his tail between his legs.

  *She was terrified – didn’t you see her face? Your father would be very proud, I’m sure.*

  *You really think so?* he asks eagerly.

  ‘If that overgrown mutt,’ says Aida, dusting herself off, ‘is the best you can do, you have a lot to learn.’

  For once I’m grateful that animals have only limited understanding of other humans. The girl looks at us for a moment. ‘Still, you tried. Many others wouldn’t. Come along!’ Aida reaches out her glove-free hand and hoists me up on to the platform. She’s stronger than she looks. ‘Welcome to Waste Mountain.’ Pointing at the kids on their screens and headsets, she goes on. ‘And we the Waste Mountain Gang, you get me?’

  Kind of.

  The girl jabs me in
the chest. ‘What you think we do?’

  I don’t know, apart from break into people’s houses with electric prods, kidnap them, steal music players and jewellery …

  ‘We all kids like you, understand. Kids with no home. Kids with no mum and dad.’ I know what that can feel like. ‘Kids Facto would like to put in one of their schools. You know what I mean.’

  Schools like Spectrum Hall. Full of kids like Justine, who I now remember was there for being in a gang. A gang of thieves who got around everywhere on bikes, nicking not just tins of food, but anything they could get their hands on.

  ‘Thieves, hackers, bikers – we got them all. Before Facto did. First we stole food when we was all hungry. Then we stole … well, lots of stuff. And now we all working together to keep us fed.’

  I think of the starving mob outside. Aida looks at my clothes, caked in dust, my face covered in scratches from our close shave outside. Reaching out, she moves to touch my grazed cheek, and then thinks better of it.

  ‘You know that man outside with the clock who tried to eat you and your trained pooch?’ she says.

  I nod, but feel the cub bristle by my side. He may not understand the exact words but he knows when he’s being talked about. Pictures of us being attacked by the mob flicker on to the ultrascreen. Aida points at the man with the gold tooth.

  ‘He sells pink. Cheap formula. Not made by Facto, but by crooks like him – from recycled rubbish they find on the tip out there. Sometimes it OK, and not kill you –’ I think of the women holding their breath, the acrid liquid filling their buckets from the keg – ‘but never have pink that gone off. Every batch got a four-hour time limit – it’s unstable, you understand? It deadly. It burn, dissolve your mouth, your teeth. Everything.’

  The man checking his clock, so he didn’t kill people. If he could help it.

  ‘Real formula, it running out. There’s not enough for everybody. Unless you live in one of them glass towers. So we steal it for others. We trying to do good, you see?’

  But I’m not listening to her any more. All I can see are the latest pictures on the ultrascreen. Grainy nighttime shots of another little girl, the girl I thought we were going to rescue. The girl I thought this gang would find.

  My best friend, climbing into a helicopter surrounded by cullers.

  Parp! Parp!

  Under the dome of rubbish, a bike horn blaring out of nowhere sends the wolf’s tail up with alarm, as he stares down the room towards a lopsided canvas shack beneath the ultrascreen, fronted by patchwork curtains.

  Standing in between the curtains is a boy in a floppy sun hat, fastened under his chin with string. He’s clutching an old-fashioned cycle horn, which he points at me.

  Parp!

  ‘So, the famous Kester Jaynes. Well, well, as I live and breathe. This is a treat and no mistake! Eh?’ he says.

  Parp!

  I flinch, but not just at the noise. How does he know my name? Not only that, but he doesn’t even sound like another boy. The other children step back as he rolls towards us with a bow-legged walk. He’s dressed like one of the kids here, in a dirty T-shirt and baggy shorts, but although his face looks smooth, his hands are wrinkled and spotted. A big smile creases across his smooth cheeks as he gets closer and shakes my hand up and down like he’s my best friend. His face looks young, but his eyes and teeth look worn and old. He glances up at the grainy pictures of Polly on the screen. ‘We just missed her. Awful bad luck!’

  Parp! Parp!

  He strides over and pinches my cheek. It’s meant to be friendly, I think, but it really hurts. ‘That look on your face! Quite right too – I’m completely forgetting myself. How very remiss of me.’ The man-boy sticks out a damp hand. ‘You can call me Littleman, everyone else does. Because as you can see – I am!’

  He laughs, shaking his floppy sun hat and small white shoulders. When I don’t laugh back, he stops abruptly. ‘Very well,’ he says. ‘I suppose you came here looking for her.’

  No, I think, I just wanted to get me and my wolf-cub half killed by a starving mob in a rubbish dump for a laugh.

  Littleman screws up his eyes and peers at me. ‘Jolly good – that makes two of us. And because I’m awful nice, I’ll show you why. We’ve been watching you both right from the moment you entered the city, you see. My associates –’ he gestures to the kids who broke into our house – ‘are very skilled on their clever computers at finding out little things like names, addresses – even your shoe size, I shouldn’t wonder. So do stop me if I start banging on about things you already know …’ Littleman clicks his fingers at the screen, and the pictures of Polly dissolve to show a photo of a man and a woman. The woman looks familiar, but I know I’ve never seen her before. They’re standing in front of a house, a house that – it’s Wind’s Edge.

  They’re standing in front of Polly’s house.

  ‘Simon and Jane Goodacre. Your young friend’s parents.’ He blows the horn twice in my face and grins. ‘Did you know they were nature historians, for example?’

  Yes, Polly had explained why their house was full of so many dried flowers pressed between old books, bones and shells laid out in glass cases. They had taught Polly everything she knew about plants, so they could all survive in the Zone, after the animals and crops disappeared.

  ‘Tremendous collectors too, as you no doubt discovered. Unstoppable they were. Every leaf of every plant in their garden, every fossil they ever found on a beach, even – bless their cottons – every animal bone they found. Believe you me, six years ago there were a lot of those!’

  Parp. Parp.

  He must see the way my face falls. Polly and I saw enough of those in the Forest of the Dead – not something I want to be reminded of.

  ‘Forgive me – I’m getting ahead of myself. You must be wondering why I’m so interested in these plant and bone collectors up in the north.’

  Littleman mops his brow with a big spotted handkerchief.

  ‘Your chum Polly probably didn’t like to say – because it’s all very “Top Secret”.’ He makes little inverted commas with his spotted hands. ‘But they ran a sort of club. A club of all those Outsiders who don’t have a nice glass tower to live in. A club working very hard to get rid of the nasty Mr Stone.’

  His brow is shining and glistening with sweat. A drop rolls down his nose, and he licks it off.

  I turn away. I know all this. Polly did like to say. She trusted me, in the end. But Littleman grabs me by the shoulder. ‘Aha! But let me tell you what you don’t know. That we had a friend in their secret club. A friend named Ma.’

  Parp! Parp! Parp!

  No wonder she made friends with Polly so quickly.

  Seeing my face at this news makes him laugh. He’s fizzing with energy, skipping in circles around us, waving his horn. Whenever he comes close enough, I can smell stale prawn-cocktail crisps on his breath.

  ‘Ma told us all about a secret weapon that these collectors were preparing. A weapon known as the Iris Capsule. A weapon that someone we both know had in her safekeeping.’

  Capsule? That’s the first time I’ve heard that word. Perhaps a capsule small enough for Polly to keep on her at all times without me knowing.

  He clicks his greasy fingers, and the grainy pictures of Polly being led aboard the helicopter are back on the screen. We both gaze at them for a moment. ‘There’s just one problem. That’s all we know about it. The Goodacres were so secretive that we don’t know exactly what the Iris is.’

  Littleman wipes his hands on his shorts again.

  ‘But my interest was purely commercial. I’m a collector too, you see. The Goodacres collected plants and bones. I mainly collect what others call junk and find a use for it. Like these.’

  He points to the prod dangling from Aida’s waist. ‘When all the cows died, farmers didn’t need these any more. We found crates of them, gathering dust in warehouses, didn’t we, my sweet?’ Aida raises an eyebrow. ‘Well, I say found, but …’ He smirks and dances behind
Aida and the others, sticking his head out between them. ‘Not just inanimate junk either! Aida was one of the first to join my collection, weren’t you, my lovely?’

  Aida glares at him. ‘You said we needed the Iris because it could change the world back to the way it was. Without Facto or Selwyn Stone.’ She spits his name out like it’s burning her mouth.

  Parp!

  ‘Only for the right price, my dear, only ever for the right price. And now Mr Stone seems to have got his fingers on our only clue to its whereabouts, I’m not sure that’s a price worth paying.’

  ‘But that’s not true. You know we could—’

  He throws his hands up in pretend shock. ‘Aida, my sweet, I didn’t know you had been put in charge of us all? When did this momentous event take place?’ Then he is suddenly leaning right in, digging into her shoulder with his long nails and spitting in her ear. ‘Never, apparently. So listen. They have the girl and no doubt the Iris to boot. We’re too late. You of all people must know that.’

  The whole room is listening again now, the chatter has died down, pale faces twisting round on their seats. I can feel their eyes boring into us.

  Aida tries to lift his hand off her shoulder, but he tightens his grip, making her wince. He raises his voice so everyone can hear. ‘You’re mine. You’re all mine. I found you. I took you all in –’ he sweeps his arm around at the platform of computers and kids – ‘when you had nowhere else to go. Your parents couldn’t feed you any more. It was here or Spectrum Hall.’

  She puts her hand on Littleman’s arm as if to calm him down, but he flings her off and carries on, gesturing at the ceiling of old mattresses and wire mesh.

  ‘I provide board and lodging of the highest quality. I keep you all safe by not picking battles we can never win. I gave you your chance with the girl, and you blew it.’ He glances at me. ‘So thank you for coming by, my dear, but you and your travelling zoo are no longer required.’