‘What else can I do?’
Kollig and Sergei shared a confused look and then stared back at the defeated man. His clothes were rags, his beard hagged and hair a knotted mass on his head and shoulders. His skin looked black and frost bitten where it was exposed and the bag across his back didn’t appear to have many months left in it.
‘She was my life,’ the man shrugged.
‘You could always try and start again …’ Kollig had never been great at putting himself in the shoes of others.
‘South? There is no life. Only death. And there’s no way north.’
No way forward. Sergei wondered, briefly, if shooting him wouldn’t be the kindest thing. Instead he lowered his weapon and walked away. Kollig swore behind him before falling into step at his side.
‘We’re not supposed to leave them.’
‘He’s not sick.’
‘He’s got plans to cross the wall.’
‘How’s he gonna do that?’
They didn’t bother discussing it further. Each knew there was no way north without a permit and the only permit Russia would offer that man was a conscription letter that would leave him stationed on the Barricade for life, just like the rest of them. He’d never find his wife. He’d probably never see another woman. He would live, but that didn’t seem enough.
‘What do you think we’re having for dinner?’
Sergei allowed himself to be distracted. They argued the pros and cons of taking another hunk of deer from the freezer versus putting up with one more week of vegetarian dishes. The winter was going to be long, they should ration the supplies, but they were both desperate for something more.
‘Maybe we can find some rabbits and make a stew or something?’ Kollig sounded so hopeful Sergei couldn’t help but smile.
‘We’ll check the north side wall and see if we can find any tracks.’
Looking back, the man was still trudging forward, heading for the ruins of the town a few kilometres west. He’d find shelter at least, and with any luck he would move on as he’d said he would. If not, well … Sergei was a pretty good sniper.
1
APC-ESSI-NREBUD666-21740021
‘When the whole world silently falls to sleep, even the mice on the shelf fall asleep,’ Jett sang softly under his breath, mimicking some whisper of memory that somehow survived the passage of time.
‘Will you shut up?’
But when he stopped singing the cold sank into his bones and the pain blossomed like fine needles along his side. He lay in the hollow he’d carved from the snow and watched his blood sluggishly dye the ice. Caught in the brief glimpses of sunlight they glittered, a sea of pink sapphires shimmering across the tundra.
Twenty-five years from before … not too long from now.
Jett couldn’t feel his hands. He stared right at his fingers, poked at his palms with broken nails but he felt neither finger nor palm. His nail beds were a dark purple, his fingertips a ghostly shade of pale only meagrely more alive than the snow blanketing the world. The buildings were discernible only by the gradual upward slant of the snow mounds as they rounded over the roofs and the dark tunnels that had been dug down to the entrances. He sat at the mouth of such a tunnel, sprawled on the chill snow and soaking up the minimal light that filtered through the thick cloud cover. The spring was ending, the winter arriving early and the snow from last season was yet to melt. Looking down at the doorway in the dark cavern below Jett could see the lines of the passing years. The snow hadn’t melted in decades and this wasn’t going to be the year it started.
‘Ioane! You’re up!’
There was no point groaning, but he did because it made him feel better. He forced himself to his feet and shuffled forward, sighing one last time at the sun and wondering how long it would wake for tomorrow. If it would wake. The days were so short, a mere hour here or there. Soon the long night would arrive and he’d forget what the sun even looked like.
He couldn’t feel his feet any more than his hands. Walking felt as if he were floating among the clouds, but that was an improvement on most days. Generally there was an underlying awareness of pain he no longer registered, muscles aching from the day to day wear of endless training and testing.
The facility had likely never been beautiful, and a few hundred years of neglect had done it no favours. The walls and floors were caked in filth and scarred by ice and frost. The rot was so deep in the old cement, it marbled the uneven surface, swirls of green and purple in the flickering sickly yellow of the lights. Corridor after corridor, a snaking river of the slow passing of time written on every passage.
Comparatively his life felt spectacularly short and insignificant. He recalled nothing of the world beyond the walls of the facility and its glacial surrounds. There was a small mountain to the north, sticking out of the tundra like a beacon. He’d hiked it a thousand times and then probably a thousand more, but from it in all directions stretched nothing at all. A white sea reflecting a golden snake as the sun worked her way across the horizon for a few months of the year and then simply darkness. Sometimes colourful lights and he would lie on the frozen world and watch the sky foxes dance in the sky, wondering if it was warmer there.
The only clean room in the facility was the medical wing. Here the walls were white washed and glossy, the scent of antiseptic heavy but unable to completely mask the taste of blood that lingered at the back of his throat when he dared inhale deeply. Memory more than reality, perhaps.
‘Ioane.’ The doctor stood by the chair and Jett barely restrained the sigh that wanted to escape. It was Blanter. He didn’t like Blanter at all. Blanter was a dick. He never smiled, never cracked a joke to make things easier. Blanter didn’t try to get to know them or ask them anything other than what was required for his work, whatever that was. He was an old, cantankerous douche and Jett fantasised about the many ways Blanter might meet his end on a regular basis. He didn’t think that was a good thing, but it was what it was.
‘In the chair.’
‘Sir,’ Jett acknowledged and forced himself to take a seat in the operatory chair. It was a familiar sequence of events. Blood was drawn, he was asked questions about his diet and physical activities. He peed in a cup. He let them take more blood. He had a skin graft taken. He had a swab or ten taken from his mouth. He answered more questions. They poked and prodded and at no point asked if that was okay. They didn’t need to because he had no real concept of what ‘no’ might look like. What refusal would mean, or that it was even possible. He’d contemplated it a few times, what might happen … And then moved on.
By the time he left the white room he was exhausted, but he went to his room and took his Ssangdo to the training room to work through his training routine. It was all habit, and all he knew. Shift a foot here, a hand there, bend the arm at that particular angle. Keep the weight even, each arc steady. Repeat until you feel ready to faint and then do it again. Repeat until your mind is numb and your body is doing it without thought. And then do it again.
When you realise the hours have passed, put the swords away and go for a run. Run until you can’t remember when you started and the dark is so settled it’s probably night and go to the mess to eat. On autopilot, shovel food in your mouth, chew and swallow. Clear the plate, put it away and go to sleep.
Tomorrow, do it all again.
Life wasn’t exactly interesting, but it was all he knew.
‘Ioane.’
The Commander was standing in front of him. Jett stared up at him, wide-eyed and vaguely aware of his porridge sliding off his spoon to plop back into his bowl. He was silently grateful it hadn’t landed on the table, in the filth where he wouldn’t want to eat it anymore for fear of what he might catch. It wasn’t advisable to get sick. They didn’t care, and sickness led to death when people didn’t care. Jett didn’t want to die.
The Commander was frowning at him and Jett saw his eyes flick to the porridge, to his empty spoon, to his face … He shoved his chair back and stood
quickly, hand slamming into position on his brow. Sometimes after a session in the white room it took him a while to remember things. Like that he was supposed to salute.
‘Go pack your bags. You’re being transferred.’
Since he’d just forgotten to salute the most superior officer in the facility, Jett thought he could be forgiven for wondering if he was also now hearing things. He contemplated if that was a side effect of blood loss or maybe something he’d been injected with, the whole time standing perfectly still with a blank expression. The Commander’s mouth somehow turned even further down at the corners, the frown exceptionally dark.
‘Ioane!’
‘Sir?’
‘Now!’ So, he hadn’t been hearing things? Jett blinked, feeling slow and sluggish and really wishing he could have at least finished his porridge because he was still hungry. But he was always hungry and there was always more porridge tomorrow so he forced his feet to move, grabbed the tray and hurried to dispose of what remained of his meal before heading for the door.
‘Pack everything!’ The Commander bellowed after him. ‘You won’t be coming back!’
Jett wasn’t sure what to make of the parting statement. Order. Whatever. Did that mean he was going to die, or that it was a permanent transfer? Regardless, he didn’t actually have much stuff. A few uniforms, a backpack and his Ssangdo. Depressing, really. When was he supposed to leave? It wasn’t exactly going to take long to put things in a bag and head for the door. Was he leaving now? Was he walking? He hadn’t seen a truck but he really didn’t want to walk off the tundra. It was huge, and the sun had set. Walking in the freezing dark was unappealing.
He wished people would tell you what you were supposed to do. It wasn’t that life could get much simpler than it already was, but weirdly that was what he wanted. Sometimes. Other times he thought it would be fun to be south of the Barricade, but he recognised that for madness.
When he got to his bunk he found a folder on his well-made bed. It had one of those red and white confidential pieces of tape binding it shut, which sent a delicious sliver of excitement through him that closely resembled how he felt whenever he got a new pair of socks. Actual new socks, with no holes in them, not handed down socks from someone who died. No one got excited about second hand socks, that was plain rude.
Jett picked the tape open and peeked inside and something happened in his chest he’d never felt before. He wondered for a brief second if he was having a heart attack and sat heavily on his bunk, staring at the front page.
He was being deployed. Finally! Even better; he was being sent to the Barricade. It had always been some kind of mythical land they spoke of behind closed doors, somewhere on some other plane of existence to the tundra. But Jett was going there. To District Six-Six-Six, somewhere in the Ukraine, under the command of one Sergeant Stepanova. The Devil’s district. There was a thick pile of reports on happenings in Six-Six-Six, and how they had been dealt with over the years. There were short filings on each of his new team members. There was a death certificate with a face he knew would haunt him for the rest of his life because he was supposed to replace it. This was to become the shadow of his existence, the reason for his presence somewhere other than here.
Montegro, Ines. Compulsory serving immigrant and acquired citizen. Deceased. A handsome face surrounded by thick, black curly hair. Caramel skin and chocolate eyes. A huge nose and sharp cheekbones. A wide, generous mouth with a hint of a smirk even in his military identification picture. How the hell was he supposed to replace that?
With shaking hands, Jett huddled under the flickering yellow light of the nearest lamp and read everything there was to know about the place he was going.
At zero three hundred hours, according to his deployment notification. By truck. Thank Russia.
Сверхсекретный
Report: 21740924-BF-MCS-19
Asset: APC-ESSI-21740021
Assessor: C-SO-Blanter, Fydor
Diagnosis: Asset deterioration has commenced, no longer suitable for transfusion or infusion trials. Maximum remaining projected use minus 365 days. Suitable for military tactical operation and field use.
Relocation: NREBUD666, immediate transfer.
APPROVED
2
C-SGT-NREBUD666-21651666
He clutched his night goggles so tightly in his fist, he felt the skin break around the metal lip holding the lining in place. Deep breaths, sucking in the crisp night air as if it could clean out his soul. He didn’t dare put them back on. In the dark he couldn’t see the bodies strewn through the silent streets. Above, a raven spun in lazy circles and sung to the dead.
I’m starving. Empty.
The door slammed open, cracking against the stone parapet and spilling a wave of heat and light across the walkway with the faint echo of laughter and a dog’s howl before it was slammed closed again. Heavy footfalls echoed in the still late-autumn air, stomping heavier than necessary to keep the blood flowing. Sasha’s feet felt frozen in his boots, despite the two pairs of woollen socks and thermal underwear. Nothing seemed to keep the cold out anymore, and the weather hadn’t even finished its turn. He stared through the thick barbed wire, down beyond the wall at the streets below but the houses were long abandoned, their windows dark. The empty streets were bathed occasionally with the bright, white sweeping lamps of the Barricade, but no movement caught the eye.
Matti came to stand at his side, but he didn’t look down at the world below, leaning against it and watching Sasha instead, as if inspecting a curious insect that might do something extraordinary at any moment.
‘Yes?’ Sasha was not a fan of the scrutiny.
‘It’s cold out here,’ Matti observed and Sasha snorted at him, waving a hand at Matti’s trademark ensemble. He was dressed in camo pants and a long-sleeved black cotton shirt with a thick black scarf. It was zero degrees.
‘Perhaps if you put a coat on …’ Sasha rolled his eyes and turned away from the abandoned city streets to lean against the parapet at Matti’s side, shoving his gloved hands further into his pockets to try and keep them from freezing.
‘It’s not that cold.’ Matti rummaged in his pocket and withdrew a beaten up pack of cigarettes. He offered one but Sasha declined. He didn’t smoke, but Matti always offered. Sasha watched him light one, fixated by the soft glow of the lighter as it briefly lit their faces.
Matti was tall, but that wasn’t unusual for the Sami, standing just above Sasha’s six foot two, but he was slender and fine boned, more fitted to the laboratory he’d been pulled from than military service. But that was most stories these days. His short-cropped blonde hair was almost as pale as his ghostly skin and his eyes were a pale grey that looked lilac in the brief flash of the lighter. He arched a brow at Sasha’s scrutiny and took a long puff of his cigarette before blowing it to the side so the wind could carry the smoke away.
‘Where’s Enzo?’
‘Drunk, as usual.’ Matti nodded his head back at the doors to the tower and sighed, taking another long draw of his cigarette and pushing his glasses back up his nose.
It wasn’t a surprise. They’d lost the fourth member of their team close on a month before to a group trying to steal supplies from the Barricade. It had been a stupid mistake. Ines had thought himself invincible, and he’d taken a stupid risk assuming the children wouldn’t be armed. A ludicrous thing, to be killed by a ten year old.
They’d been placed on minimal duties—meaning they were not permitted to do town patrols—until a replacement team member could be sent, and Enzo had been drunk every night. Ines was a childhood friend and it had hit him hardest, but they each were dealing with it in their own way. Enzo drank his demons, Matti smoked them and Sasha preferred to let the cold burn them from his soul.
Attempts to cross the Barricade and attacks on its supplies were increasing, but they always did at this time of year. In summer poverty was survivable, but as the winter closed in desperation took over and the fear of the firs
t snow drove people to try the impossible.
The Barricade ran from what was once the Dutch and German border through Germany, Poland, the Ukraine and old Russia, across northern Kazakhstan and cutting through China in a wide arc. A monstrous wall, an ironic testament to a threat made by some American President about a different people entirely a hundred years before but taken to heart by the fear-mongering Russian communist party when they drove south in their campaign to become the world’s new superpower.
A pretty successful campaign, if you lived in the new Northern Russian Empire and breathed the propaganda, which they all did. And the alternative didn’t seem much better; south of the wall the Infection blossomed, a viral disease that rotted the body and sent you mad. The Barricade had been largely successful not only in closing off the Empire from the south, but in keeping the infected out.
There were no winners on either side of the wall.
In the distance thunder rumbled and lightning flickered on the northern horizon.
‘Storm will be here in an hour or two,’ Matti grumbled, sighing as he tapped the ash from the end of his cigarette. ‘If it drops a few degrees we’ll get snow.’
It was early in the season, but they were on the Ukraine border and it wasn’t unusual to see snow before winter arrived. It would almost be kinder; the rain had a tendency to flood the town and the wall closed the water in, creating a breeding ground for insects and the Infection.
‘Did you fix the leak on the lighthouse?’ He glanced along the top of the wall at the opposite tower, the lights inside turning in a lazy circle the only sign of life. Each district on the Barricade had two towers; one to live in and a lighthouse. Each district had a four-man team responsible for manning the wall and its upkeep. Sasha had been sergeant in charge of District Six-Six-Six for seven years, and Matti had been there with him for six of those. Enzo and Ines had been there when they arrived, but not for long. Not too many losses, compared to the other districts, but too many for Sasha’s conscience.
Barricade Page 2
