Jed and the Junkyard Wars

by Steven Bohls

  “Thousands of years ago, all the towns were built right on the ground. Golden cities. With cans of food bigger than this tug. And batteries, too. More batteries than a whole town of men could carry.”

  Sprocket blew on her shatterlance’s barrel. “What about a town of women?”

  Pobble rolled his eyes. “Still too many.”

  “What were they using to carry the batteries?” Sprocket asked. “Did everyone have bags? Or did they just use their hands?”

  “There were just lots of batteries, okay?” Pobble said. Sprocket winked at Pobble. “The people who lived there were as gold as the town itself.”

  “So where’d they get all those batteries?” Sprocket asked.

  “They probably had giant junk makers or something. I don’t know.”

  Sprocket nodded. “Oh! That makes perfect sense. Sorry for interrupting.”

  Pobble ignored her. “One day, a disease spread through the town. The blotch. Everyone started getting sick…coughing and stumbling. Doctors tried patches and medicine, but nothing worked. It was as if the gold itself was diseased. Folk got sicker, until they were so sick, their bodies stopped working right. Arms…legs…fingers…toes…all just wilted and died. Like they were dead stumps clinging to nearly dead townsfolk. The dead limbs rotted so badly, they started falling right off. Flopped straight to the ground. Deader than a slug stuck to the bottom of a boot. Townsfolk limped around the streets—some with barely half an arm to drag their own body along. They grew so desperate, they pulled apart machines and sewed scrap parts right to their elbows and knees. But the disease didn’t stop. It rotted away gold until there wasn’t gold left to rot. The townsfolk replaced so many parts, they became empty. No souls. Just…empty inside. And they still crawl the yard today. Flying about in broken ships, making everyone who sees them feel as empty as them, sounding more like clanking metal than people, looking so awful that folk now just call them…dread.”

  Jed waited for Pobble to continue, but he didn’t. He sat back and released a deep, story-conclusion-style sigh.

  “Then what happened?” Jed asked.

  “Happened with what?”

  “The dread. What’s the end of the story?”

  Pobble looked from Jed to Sprocket. “That was the end. That’s the story of where the dread came from.”

  “You’re saying they’re real?” Jed asked with a yeah, right, there’s no way I’m believing that tone.

  Pobble laughed once. “Of course they’re real! What else do you think lives in the fog?” He pointed a stubby finger at the wall map. Jed eyed the map’s wide black edge.

  “That story can’t be true. Those things can’t actually exist.”

  “The dread,” Pobble repeated. “You know…the dread.” He hooked his arms together and twisted his expression to look like scrambled eggs.

  “The dread,” Sprocket echoed, as if Jed simply couldn’t understand Pobble’s accent.

  “Yeah, no, I heard that part.”

  Sprocket interjected, “Denver?”

  “Denver.”

  She stood and motioned for Jed to join her at the map.

  She pointed to the far left near the orange border. It read THE FRINGE.

  “We picked you up here,” she said. “Show me where Denver is.”

  “I’m from somewhere else. Somewhere not on here.”

  “Here?” Sprocket walked to the other side and touched the black edge of the map.

  Jed shook his head. “Not there, either. I don’t think so, at least.”

  Brown letters inside the black edge read THE FOG.

  “I’m from somewhere other than the fringe and the fog. I’ve never been anywhere on this map. And I’ve never heard of the dread!”

  “You’re serious,” Sprocket said. “Completely serious?”

  “Completely,” Jed said. “Do those things—the dread—exist?”

  “Let me show you something,” Sprocket said, waving Jed to follow. “And you can tell me if they exist.”

  Jed, Sprocket, and Pobble walked to the main deck, near the largest mast. Pobble took a can of diced tomatoes with him and ate as they walked.

  “There,” Sprocket said.

  Halfway up the smokestack, a head sat mounted to a metal plate. The face was a patchwork of bolts and springs. Gears littered the inside of its skull and left cheek. Frayed cables and wires fused patches of leathery skin with scraps of rusted metal.

  Where its left eye should have been, there was only a dark hole, its edges withered and wrinkled. In place of its right eye sat a brass spyglass with a cracked lens.

  “That thing was a dread?” Jed asked.

  Before Sprocket could answer, the gears inside the shriveled head ground to life. Sparks dribbled from the frayed wires, and the face tilted.

  Though it had no eyes, Jed knew it was looking straight at him. He could feel it. As if the empty hole wasn’t empty at all.

  Then it spoke. “Well, well. What have we here…?”

  Jed lurched backward.

  The gears spun faster, and its ashy lips curled into a grin.

  “Here we have Captain Spyglass,” Sprocket said as if she were a museum tour guide. “Captain of the smokestack!”

  Pobble chuckled.

  “It’s alive?” Jed said.

  “I wouldn’t say what that thing is counts as alive, exactly,” Sprocket said. “It wriggles around and speaks, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Of course I’m alive, little boy. Alive but alone. All alone. I do wish I had a friend. Someone to talk to…someone who would hold me…someone I could pull apart into little pieces and slurp up for breakfast. Will you be my friend?”

  Jed took another step back.

  “Charming, isn’t he?” Sprocket said.

  “Come up here and give me a hug, little boy. You can stand on the fat one there. Jump on him like a trampoline.”

  Pobble’s lower lip scrunched in embarrassed anger.

  “Oh, don’t look so pouty,” the dread said to Pobble. “It makes you look fat. Then again, being fat also makes you look fat, I suppose.”

  “Hey, shut your ugly mouth,” Sprocket said. She took Pobble’s can of tomatoes and chucked it at the dread. The can smacked it square in the face, but the thing didn’t even flinch.

  “One of these nights,” it said to Sprocket, “when you’re sleeping safe and sound, I’m going to find you, and then I’m going to slurp up every last bit of soup you keep inside that soft, pink bag you call skin.”

  “Sure you will,” Sprocket said. “Only one problem: you’re a bit short on legs. And arms. And your face is nailed to a smokestack. Oh, and we killed all your buddies. So good luck with that.”

  The dread dragged its tongue around the rim of its lips. “You’ll be the first to go. I won’t roast you or boil you like I’ll do with the rest of this crew. You, I’ll have raw. And next I’ll eat you,” it said, tilting its head toward Pobble. “Though…that might take a while.”

  “Remember the whole ‘no legs’ thing?” Sprocket said.

  “Don’t worry about me, dear. I’m patient. So when I do get my legs back—because eventually I will—know that I’m coming for you.”

  “C’mon,” Pobble said, “let’s go.” He and Sprocket turned and began walking away.

  But before Jed could follow, the head looked at him again, its empty black socket boring into him as if the cavity itself was staring at him.

  It spoke in a voice that was barely a whisper. “Happy birthday.”

  Cold shuddered through Jed’s arms. “What?” he whispered in return.

  The spyglass protruded another inch, focusing on Jed’s eyes. “Welcome back.”

  They stared at each other in silence for another moment.

  “You okay?” Pobble’s voice said right behind him.

  Jed recoiled.

  “Whoa, there. It’s just me. You okay?”

  “Huh? Oh, I’m fine. Sorry, you just startled me.”

  Pobble slapped J
ed on the back. “I know what you mean. That creeper makes my stomach feel like leftover green beans.”

  “Yeah,” Jed said, staring back at the dread’s now-expressionless face.

  Pobble grinned. “You know what always makes that feeling go away?”

  “What?”

  “Strawberries. I have a secret stash of fruit cans in the mess. How ’bout we share a can later?”

  “Save me some peaches and it’ll stay a secret stash,” Sprocket said.

  Pobble smirked. “Yeah, okay.”

  “Also, would you watch Golden Boy while I check on the nest?”

  “How about it, Jed?” Pobble asked. “Want to take a tour?”

  Jed nodded. For the first time since he’d been on board, someone had used his actual name. “I’d love to.”

  “Precious,” Sprocket said. “You two go play.” She turned to walk away, but paused and added over her shoulder, “Don’t touch anything.”

  Pobble tugged Jed toward a cabin at the front of the ship. “To the helm.” He led the way up a back staircase to the bridge. The small cabin door barely fit Pobble’s bulk. The room was open, empty, and well lit by huge windows on each wall, which gave a full view of the junkyard.

  “This is the helm,” Pobble said. “Controls are a bit different, since Bessie was a dread tug before we stole her. Snatched her right out of a dread shipyard from under their dread noses!”

  Thick bolts anchored a throne in the center of the room. Levers—each at least the height of Jed’s waist—shot up from slots in the floor. Some were forward, some back, but each joined to a base. Five pedals, made of pie tins, sat in a half circle around the huge chair. Hoses and pipes snaked from the pedals, through the levers and gears and around the back.

  Jed’s eyes lingered on the pie tins. Every Saturday Mom made something lemon for dessert: lemon meringue pie, lemon bars, lemon-ginger cheesecake, lemon-coconut cupcakes, lemon pound cake…They’d sit together and thumb through their Lemon Anthology—a collection created over the years of the finest lemon desserts.

  “Which one for today?” She always let Jed pick. As a result, they’d had lemon poppy-seed doughnuts every Saturday for two months. Lemon poppy-seed doughnuts were exactly what he wanted. Right then. Hot icing soaked to the doughnut’s core. So soft it would melt between his teeth.

  “It’s Saturday,” he whispered to himself, his tongue tingling.

  “It’s what?” Pobble asked.

  Jed snapped back to the present. “Oh, nothing.” His fingers were in his pocket—wrapped around the lemon he’d brought.

  “Pretty neat, huh?” Pobble rested his fists on his hips and surveyed the room.

  “I’ve never seen anything like it. But where’s the wheel?”

  “Wheel?” Pobble looked around.

  Jed shook his head. “Never mind.”

  It was then that he noticed a red button atop one of the levers. His heart jumped. It is imperative that you push every red button you find.

  Pobble turned to the side and looked out over the junkyard.

  He’s not looking. Do it. Now.

  Jed reached for the lever. But before his fingers could touch the button, it turned green.

  He froze, arm still outstretched.

  “Get away from the controls!” a voice shouted. Kizer stood in the doorway, hands clenching the door’s frame so tightly, his arms shook.

  “Oh—I—uh…”

  “You were what?” Kizer released the frame and stepped into the room. “I saw you reach for the altitude stick. What were you going to do?”

  “I don’t know—I—”

  Kizer turned to Pobble. “Why did you let that thing in here?”

  “Just giving a tour of the—”

  “Out.” He jabbed a finger at the open door.

  Pobble waddled away. Jed tried to follow, but Kizer grabbed his shoulder. “Not you.”

  Kizer bent closer until his breath tickled Jed’s cheeks. “I know what you are.” His words were slow and doused in venom.

  “What I am?” Jed stepped back, but Kizer closed the gap.

  “Let’s chat about what you said earlier in the captain’s quarters about living junk. You seem to know an awful lot about it.”

  “I was just trying to explain—”

  Kizer grabbed a wad of skin on Jed’s arm. “This doesn’t fool me.”

  “Ouch!” Jed yelped.

  Kizer pulled the skin to his nose and inhaled. His lower lip jutted out as if he’d just breathed vinegar fumes. “Pretty skin like that? Not a wrinkle. Not a scar. Smells like…soap.”

  “Thanks? I—um—shower when I can?” His answers lifted at their ends as if they were questions.

  Kizer released the skin. “Under all that sky water? Beyond the fringe? A glittertale place that doesn’t exist?”

  “What are you accusing me of?”

  Kizer pinched some hairs from Jed’s head and yanked.

  “Ow! Get off me!” He shoved Kizer and backed against one of the windows, rubbing the now-tender patch of scalp.

  Kizer studied the hairs, then sprinkled them over the floor. “Don’t lie to me. You didn’t even feel that! Manipulative parasites like you don’t feel anything.”

  “Manipulative what?”

  “We both know you’re not from the fringe. You’re just a little monster from the fog…snuck on board to devour us all.”

  “The fog? Are you serious? How could you even—”

  “Where’s your beacon?”

  “My what?”

  “Show me!” Kizer said. He drew a shatterbox. The weapon wasn’t elaborate like one of Sprocket’s, but Jed guessed it still fired just fine. “I saw you tampering with the altitude controls.”

  Jed held up his hands and shook his head. “I was just looking around!”

  “You’re not a very clever dread, are you?”

  “Dread?”

  Jed glanced out the window behind him. It’s not too high to jump. Not high enough to break my legs, at least.

  Kizer nodded. “Dread.”

  “How could you possibly think I’m one of those things?”

  Kizer pulled the hammer on his shatterbox. It clicked. He curled a finger around the trigger. “You’re just wearing somebody else’s skin…hiding underneath pretty, soaped-clean pink.”

  “I swear, I’m not a dread! This is my real skin!”

  “I was watching you earlier. I saw the way you looked at that stack ornament.”

  Jed’s brain crackled, tingly with guilt over what the dread had said to him.

  Jed’s voice trembled. “Looked at it how?”

  “I know what I saw. You two are planning something, aren’t you? Mutiny arrangements? Makeup tips on looking human? Do you even feel real emotions? No! You don’t! And you’re not going to feel anything when I squeeze this trigger, because you’re not a real person. You’re scrap! So stop acting scared!”

  “Would you just listen to me?”

  “I’m not going to let you slurp up this crew and turn us into twisted, clicking beetles. Time for you to go.”

  His finger flexed against the trigger. Jed tensed, ready to jump through the window. The bridge door flung open, and Captain Bog stomped into the room.

  “What’s going on?” he shouted.

  Kizer flinched. “He—”

  “He what? If you’re going to make a mess on my bridge, and if I have to get Pobble up here to scrub pieces of that boy out of the gears, there’d better be a good reason.”

  “Captain, this boy’s a dread. I saw him acting suspicious around the head. I think they’re working together to kill us and take the ship.”

  “What?” Captain Bog asked.

  “I saw him reaching for the altitude controls. He’s going to crash the ship, then kill us and take our skins, and—”

  Jed held his hands higher. “I don’t know what he’s talking about. I’m not a dread. I’m not trying to kill anyone!”

  “Keep your mouth shut until I tell you
to open it,” Captain Bog said. He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and index finger. “Kizer, is this Henry all over again?”

  “I’m telling you: he’s full of gears and scrap. That pretty sheet of skin is a disguise! He’s a dread, Captain. I know it.”

  “Gears?” Jed said. “I don’t have any gears!” He lifted an arm and poked it to show how squishy it was.

  “That’s what you said about Henry.” Captain Bog’s voice was careful and steady.

  Kizer shook his head twitchily, as if a fly had landed on his nose. “I’m not crazy.”

  “That scrawny runt who can’t climb a ladder? You think he’s a dread? All his parts are matching. I don’t see any extra clunk on him. Do you?”

  Kizer considered Jed. “He’s hiding it.”

  Captain Bog shook his head. “All the parts match. All in the right spots. You ever seen a dread like that?” Kizer shook his head with a strained motion. “Me neither. Besides, he’ll be off in a few hours. Won’t be our problem.”

  “They don’t leave.” Kizer lowered his shatterbox. “They never leave. He’ll find a reason to stay and kill us all.”

  “All right.” Captain Bog patted Kizer’s shoulder. “Glad we had this chat.” He pointed at Jed. “You. Out.”

  Jed strode past Kizer.

  “You keep riling up my crew,” the captain added, “I’ll lock you in a closet.”

  Pobble waited for Jed on the deck. He slapped him on the back with a meaty hand. “Sorry about Kizer. He’s been a bit”—he twirled his finger around his ear—“ever since he escaped the fog.”

  “Escaped?”

  “Dread raided his township a while back. Scooped up all the townsfolk and left. Kizer couldn’t save no one’s skin but his own. Who knows what he went through. Now he thinks every stranger is a dread.”

  “Like Henry?” Jed recalled the name.

  “Henry was lookout before Sprocket. Kizer said he was a dread. Always yelling at him. Accusing him.”

  “What happened?”

  “Poor kid lost his leg in a junkstorm. Since no gears tumbled out, Kizer let it go. Till now, I s’pose.”

  “Is he going to try to do something to me?” Jed asked. “Like kill me?”

  “Nah, Cap’n will set him straight,” Pobble said. “Unless you really are a dread.”

  Jed’s gut squished in on itself as he thought of the whispering voice.