The Wastelanders

by K. S. Merbeth

  “Has this happened before?”

  “What, facing imminent death? Yeah, all the time.”

  “No, I mean being transported like this.”

  “Oh, right.” He pauses to think. “Nope, don’t think so.”

  “Well, what do you think about it?”

  “I’m just glad not to have a noose around my neck, ain’t you?”

  “I guess.” I lean against a crate, letting my head loll back.

  My efforts to rest are undermined when the truck starts moving. The engine makes a god-awful roaring sound as it starts up, and continues to growl unpleasantly. The compartment shakes and shifts as we move, making me slide around on the floor. So, no sleep for me. I sit up and look around at the others.

  “So … what are we gonna do?” I ask. Nobody answers. I sigh and shift, stretching out my legs and trying to better position myself so I won’t slide so much. When I look down at my outstretched boots, a realization hits me.

  When they put us in jail, they took away our weapons and my backpack, but they didn’t search me very thoroughly. Perhaps because I don’t seem like much of a threat—which is a valid assessment—they didn’t bother to check inside my boots … which means I still have my knife.

  I squirm around in vain attempts to dislodge it. As it turns out, it’s not such an easy task without being able to use my hands. I awkwardly wiggle one way, and another, and stick my foot in the air and shake it, but nothing happens.

  “You gotta piss or something, Kid?” Wolf asks. When I look up, everyone is staring at me. I blush.

  “Err, no,” I say. “It’s my knife. I think I still have it.”

  “Well, shit, get it out then!” Wolf says.

  “That’s what I’m trying to do!” A frustrated sigh escapes my lips. I abandon all dignity and stick both feet in the air, flailing them with all the effort I can muster up. Finally the knife falls out, and narrowly misses hitting me in the face. It clatters onto the floor just beside my head.

  “Nice technique,” Wolf says. I ignore him, and push myself up to a sitting position. I slide closer to the knife, trying to grab it with my bound hands.

  Just when I’m finally close, the truck makes a sharp turn. I topple over and slide across the floor to slam against the opposite wall. The knife slides, as well—and ends up just beside Pretty Boy.

  I look at the knife and up at him. A look I can’t identify flashes through his eyes, and I remember what Tank said about not trusting him. If he got free, would he even help the rest of us?

  “Aw hell no,” Wolf says from the other side of the truck. “Don’t even think about it, Pretty Boy.” He starts to scoot over, fixing him with a hard gaze. “Slide the knife to me.”

  Pretty Boy bends over, reaching for the knife. Wolf scoots faster, face screwed up in determination. Just as Pretty Boy is about to grab the knife, Wolf launches himself at him, head-butting him in the chest. The air goes out of Pretty Boy with an audible oof and he collapses with Wolf on top of him. The knife skitters away.

  “Get off of me!” Pretty Boy yells, attempting to wiggle free.

  “Give me the knife!”

  “I don’t even have it!”

  “You guys are both being idiots,” Tank says. “Calm your shit and stop making so much noise.”

  Rather than heed his advice, Wolf does his best to beat the crap out of Pretty Boy despite his lack of hands.

  The truck swerves suddenly and sends everyone tumbling. I crash into the side of the compartment once more, slide back the other way as the truck swerves again, and end up sprawled across Dolly’s lap. She looks down at me with a slightly alarmed expression as I wiggle helplessly. The others are similarly entangled in a heap of limbs. The truck stops.

  “The hell just happened?” Wolf asks, still half on top of Pretty Boy. The latter tries to say something, but with his face pressed against the floor of the truck it’s hard to decipher it.

  “The truck stopped,” I say.

  “Very helpful, Kid, as always.”

  The growl of the engine cuts off, and so does our conversation. In the silence I hear doors slamming as the guards exit the truck, followed by the crunch of footsteps.

  The truck doors swing open and sunlight pours in.

  “What are you idiots doing?” the guard asks, scrutinizing us.

  I notice the knife glinting conspicuously a few feet away. I try to slide a foot over to cover it, but unfortunately the movement only captures his attention. He climbs into the compartment and snatches up the weapon.

  “Ah, trying to escape, eh?” he asks, smirking and dangling it from one hand. “No such luck, sharkies.” He turns around and yells to his partner. “Found the problem yet?”

  “Tires are blown. We got spares?” a voice answers from outside.

  “Yeah, I’ll get ’em. Find out what we hit, would you?”

  “Got it.”

  Meanwhile, the guard uses my knife to cut a length of rope off the supply crates.

  “Just so you lot don’t get any ideas …” He reaches down, forcibly pushing and pulling the pile of us apart. It’s hard for anyone to retaliate much, bound as we are. I squirm around until I manage to flip onto my stomach and crane my neck, trying to see what he’s doing to the others. I can’t tell what’s happening, but it sounds like a struggle.

  I can finally see when the guard moves: He’s used the rope to bind Wolf and Pretty Boy back-to-back.

  “No fucking way,” Wolf growls. Pretty Boy looks horrified.

  “Good luck escaping now,” the guard says, grinning. He’s about to give the same treatment to Tank and Dolly when his partner returns.

  “We have a problem,” he says.

  “Yeah?”

  “A big problem.”

  He turns to him.

  “What is it?”

  The guard outside holds something up. I see the glint of sun off of metal, blades sharp as fangs. My stomach twists as I realize what it is: a strip of road spikes.

  “This wasn’t an accident,” he says, his face paling.

  “Shit.” The guard lets the rope drop and stands, reaching for his gun. “Raiders on the trade route. We need to get the hell out of here, and—”

  Gunfire interrupts his sentence, and the guard standing outside falls with a choked cry. The man inside stares, slack-jawed. In the distance I hear whoops and catcalls and shouts, growing closer by the second. It doesn’t just sound like raiders. It sounds like crazies.

  “Untie us,” Pretty Boy begs. “Please. Please. Don’t let me die tied to this maniac!”

  “For once I agree. It would be fucking embarrassing,” Wolf says.

  The guard ignores them. He runs to the back of the truck and grabs his injured companion, hoisting him up. He slams the doors shut behind him and bends down to assess the damage.

  “I’m fine,” the wounded man gasps, while the blood leaking from him says otherwise.

  “I can treat his wound,” Pretty Boy says. “I can help. Untie me.”

  “Shut up!” the uninjured guard yells. He rips off part of his shirt and ties it around the bullet hole, his sloppiness revealing he has no idea what he’s doing.

  Outside, the noise draws closer every second. Soon it’s clear they’re just outside, and there are a lot of them. Fists and weapons rain down on the sides of the truck, the sound exploding like gunfire inside. I flinch as something hits the wall just beside my head. Since the truck doors open from the outside, I know they’re messing with us, toying with their prey before they go for the kill.

  “Just listen to me. Listen. There’s no way you can fight all of them,” Pretty Boy says, speaking like he’s trying to coax an animal out of hiding. “If you untie us, we can help. We won’t tell anyone you let us free.”

  The guard hesitates. As his ailing friend loses strength and consciousness, he seems to consider the offer. He reaches into his pocket for the knife.

  The doors to the truck burst open. Noise rushes inside, cackling and jeering fillin
g the truck. There’s a mob outside. Faces swim in my vision as they clamber to get inside. I scoot away and press my back against the crates. The guard pulls out his gun and fires wildly into the crowd outside. Few of them react, and they cackle madly as their companions fall. For every one that goes down, another two spring up. They look wild, faces crusted with dried blood, skin peeling from sunburn, scraps of clothing hanging off their lean and scarred bodies.

  These aren’t raiders like Wolf’s crew. They’re madmen who know nothing but mindless violence. Sometimes the wastelands swallow men up and they don’t come out the same. Whether it’s the radiation or the heat or something else, their minds are just broken.

  Panic surges in my gut as a memory hits me: hiding in an abandoned building with my papa, a pack of crazies right outside. I never saw them, but I heard them as they screamed and jeered. Papa held one hand over my mouth. The other held a gun, and it shook. I had never seen him shake like that.

  They didn’t find us, but another traveler wasn’t so lucky. She screamed all night, just yards away from our hiding spot. Papa had to put her down himself, after the crazies had left her writhing in the dust.

  I drag my mind back to the present as the mob surges forward and into the truck, a swarming mass of crazed faces and reaching arms. The fallen guard goes first, swallowed by greedy hands. The second guard is next. He tries to fight back, gun firing several times. It doesn’t make a difference. He disappears with a scream.

  I catch a glint of something on the floor and recognize my knife, forgotten again. I wriggle my way toward it. Luckily, the mob seems to be temporarily distracted with their new playthings. I can hear the guards screaming, and try to ignore my rising panic as I grab the knife. I saw frantically at the ropes on my wrists. The knife is slippery in my sweaty palms, but the rope gradually thins.

  I can only hope it will be fast enough. The mob’s bloodthirst won’t be sated for long.

  “Pass the knife, Kid!” Pretty Boy hisses from behind me. “Hurry!”

  “It’s hard,” I huff out, struggling with my nearly numb fingers. Finally, the knife saws through and the ropes go slack. Blood rushes back into my hands.

  I get on my hands and knees and crawl to the closest person: Dolly. I hack at the ropes binding her, ignoring the pins-and-needles sting as feeling returns to my fingers. I’m not fast enough.

  A hand closes on my leg, and I’m yanked backward too quickly to scream. The knife clatters out of my hands, and I catch a glimpse of the horrified faces of the others as the crazies drag me away.

  XIII

  Crazies

  I’m in a sea of writhing bodies. I find myself pulled and pushed, choked by the reek of blood and sweat. Hands tug at my clothes, my hair, my skin. Nails like claws drag across my arms and leave bloody trails. I open my mouth to scream, but can’t even hear it through the noise around me. It’s a huge pack of crazies, at least a couple dozen from what I can see.

  I use my bony elbows to jab around me. It’s enough to grant me open air. I try to run, but a leg catches me in the knees and sends me tumbling. My face hits the dirt. The mob cackles as they drag me back.

  Fists and feet pummel me, but never steel. They don’t want to kill me yet, they just want to play with me. The thought is not reassuring.

  I notice a flash of Dolly’s blue hair amid the chaos and fight my way in her direction. I shove my way through the crowd until she’s within sight, and struggle to stay there as the mob surges around me.

  “Pretty, pretty,” a man says, leering at her. He runs a hand down the front of her shirt and tugs, ripping the fabric. Dolly’s eyes flash dangerously.

  A second later, a knife is buried deep into the man’s eye. He screams and Dolly yanks it back out, slashing at others nearby. The man stumbles into the crowd and they laugh at him, shove him to the dirt, excited by the sight of his blood. Several jump on the weakened man, tearing into him with knives and teeth.

  I try to move closer to Dolly, but someone grabs me by the hair and yanks me back. Another hand clamps on to my arm and pulls me in the opposite direction. A vicious tug-of-war ensues. They tug me one way and then the other until it feels like I’m going to be ripped in half. Finally the hand on my head loses its grip, pulling out some hair in the process, and I stumble forward. The hand releases me, and I fall to my knees. Dolly is gone. I’m surrounded by grinning, mad faces.

  A creature barely recognizable as a woman crouches next to me, serrated knife in hand. I stop struggling as she lightly presses the tip of the blade against my wrist. The steel ghosts its way up my arm and neck while I cringe. She rests the flat of it against my face.

  “Eyes or tongue?” she asks, breath reeking of rotten meat.

  “Um, neither, please,” I squeak out, trying to breathe as little as possible.

  She smiles too wide, showing a nearly toothless mouth.

  “Tongue it is,” she says. She shoves her free hand into my mouth, and I choke on the taste of blood and dirt. Before she can grab my tongue, I bite down as hard as I can. My teeth break the skin and she screeches wildly. She yanks her hand back and the knife swings down toward me.

  I catch her wrist with my free hand with the knife just inches from my face. We strain, unmoving, neither of us strong enough to overpower the other. The woman is stick-thin, but her anger and savagery lend her strength. The knife inches closer to my face; soon it’s just a centimeter away from my nose.

  I wrench my other hand free just in time. With her knife about to sink into my skin, I instinctively jut my hand out to stop it. The steel cuts deep into my palm, and pain shoots all the way up to my elbow. I force her back, she yanks the knife away with a snarl—and the blade catches my little finger, slicing it clean off.

  I stare at the stump where my finger used to be as blood begins to gush out. Luckily the woman with the knife is just as distracted as I am, though by something else: Tank charging into the fray. With his hands tied behind his back, he barrels into the crowd, knocking people down left and right. He goes down quickly but takes several others with him, crushing them beneath his weight.

  I take advantage of the distraction and scramble to my feet, holding my injured hand against me and shoving people aside as I make my way back to the truck.

  Wolf and Pretty Boy are in the crowd as well. They’re still tied back-to-back. Wolf seems intent on following Tank’s lead and rushing into the mob, while Pretty Boy is trying to run in the opposite direction. They lurch back and forth, neither of them able to get anywhere.

  I force my way through the mob of crazies, weaving between them and darting under their legs. Everyone is distracted enough by the others that I can slip by and reach the truck. I pull myself into the back, panting, and crouch beside the boxes. My hand has gone numb, but blood is still spurting. And my finger … my finger is gone. Where my pinky used to be is just a bloody stub. I stare at it, wiggling my other fingers. It’s strange, as though I can feel it still there, but it’s gone.

  And the others are still out in that awful mob. I have to do something. I refuse to run away and hide like Pretty Boy would. But what can I do? My knife is gone. I have nothing.

  My heart sinks as I hear the crazies approach, their loud and barely human voices signaling their arrival. The crazies don’t even speak properly, only using guttural noises and broken phrases to communicate. I hear “the small one” and “blood” and “kill” as they approach. Everything else is unintelligible, but none of it sounds pretty. I squeeze between two boxes, trying to hide without losing my view of the outside. Three of them are approaching. Luckily, none of them are armed; unluckily, they could easily kill me bare-handed. Desperate, I grab some cans of food out of a box, cradling them in one arm and poising to throw with my uninjured hand. As soon as one of the men climbs into the truck, I send a metal can flying at him.

  It sails right past his head. He looks surprised, then cackles madly. The next can catches him right in the teeth and sends him stumbling backward. He falls.

/>   Not waiting for the next one, I take my ammo and run, jumping out of the truck and past them. I stagger precariously for a few steps before catching my balance, and take a look behind me at the three men. They stare at me. I throw a can at them, catching one in the shoulder, and take off running. Shouts and howls follow me.

  I run as fast as my scrawny legs can move. My path loops around the perimeter of the truck, marked with an occasional pause to launch a can of food behind me. I run around the truck once, twice, three times, gasping for breath and wondering how I haven’t been caught yet—and a man steps into my vision, growling like a dog. I skid to a stop, turn in the other direction, and collide with one of the guys who were chasing me. I stumble and fall. The remaining cans spill from my hands.

  One of the men grabs at me, but I dodge his grip and roll sideways—and keep rolling, until I reach the truck. Not the most graceful exit, but it’ll do. I tumble under and crawl into the darkness, panting for breath.

  I’m not alone down here. For one moment I expect it to be Pretty Boy hiding again. Instead I find one of the guards. It’s the one who was shot, and apparently he isn’t quite dead yet. He raises his head, eyes dull, and points a gun in my direction, but it’s halfhearted. After a moment he lets his head and weapon fall again, and sighs wearily. His head droops back, as if he exhaled the last of his energy.

  I crawl closer and ensure his eyes are closed. When he doesn’t respond, I snatch the gun out of his hand. His eyes flutter open and he looks at me again, but does nothing.

  I retreat, half-dragging the gun. It’s a huge, heavy assault rifle, not at all like my handgun. When I crawl out from beneath the truck, I try to hold it like I know how to use it.

  The three crazies from before are still there, waiting. One of them grins at the sight of me.

  “Gun?” he says, jerking closer. “Ha. Ha, ha. Too big for the little boy.”

  “As if,” I say, trying to sound confident. I pull the trigger.

  Bullets spray wildly, mostly hitting sand as I stumble from the recoil. Somehow, miraculously, I manage to hit the man. He falls with a snarl, blood streaming from multiple bullet holes.