ALBA

by HL TRUSLOVE

  Neither of the soldiers follow you, but you do hear screams. It’s with a sick feeling you realise that Hamish, the other man working in the tent, wasn’t as lucky as you were.

  All through the camp, people are being slaughtered. It looks like the enemy forces overpowered the side you allied with (wrongly, you think darkly). Surprised raiders get struck down with bullets and knives, dropping like flies around you. All you can do is push onwards, keep running to try to put some distance between you and the bloodshed. A bullet whizzes by you, centimetres from your ear, and you curse.

  You keep going, running past the tents and out into the field. You hear a couple more gunshots after you but don’t slow down, continuing to run until your legs feel on fire. You know you won’t be safe until you can no longer hear the sounds of fighting.

  You don’t know how long you go for. You only slow down when you’re absolutely certain you can no longer hear gunfire or death. You collapse into the grass and catch your breath.

  Pain flares through your arm suddenly. The adrenaline is wearing off, and the wound you got earlier from the blade to the shoulder is beginning to make itself known.

  You peel off your coat and inspect the gash. It’s not deep, but it is long, and blood is trickling from it nastily. You sigh and spend some time cleaning it out before wrapping it up in whatever you can scavenge from your pack to use as bandages. It still smarts, but you seem to have staved off the worst of it.

  You lie back and feel the throb of the wound along with your heartbeat. It’s going to be an uncomfortable night of camp, you think.

  END.

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  26.17

  Your eyes dart to the canister in your hand. They clearly don’t know what it is. You look to them and smile, and the soldiers’ eyes go wide.

  Everything happens quite quickly after that.

  You throw the bomb towards the raiders and as you do, you dart backwards. You roll over the table that’s been set up and grab the side as you go, flipping it over so it acts as a shield when you land. You try to call out to Hamish to join you, but there isn’t enough time.

  The explosion is almost deafening. You see Hamish shredded by the blast and have to shield your eyes against the flash of light that comes with it. The table is blown backwards into you, and slams you hard enough to leave a few large bruises – at least it stops you from being killed.

  The smoke is thick in the air. You bring your neckline over your mouth to act as a breathing guard and clench your eyes shut to stop them stinging. You put your hands out in front of you and feel around, looking for the edge of the tent. You put your hand in something wet, and you’re not sure if it’s an exploded carton of liquid or it’s what’s left of Hamish. You don’t risk opening your eyes to find out.

  Getting out of the tent is a long process, the smoke finding its way into your nose even though you try to block it out as best you can. Eventually, your wandering hands find the fabric of the tent and you haul it up, crawling out into the fresh air.

  You choke as you expel the last of the smoke from your system, but don’t have time to stop. It looks like the camp has been overrun with enemy forces. Someone sees you and shouts, but you scrabble to your feet and run as fast as you can. It’s hard work, and your chest still stings, but you don’t stop until you can no longer hear the sounds of fighting, nor the bullets whizzing past your ears. You allow yourself to collapse in exhaustion when the only sounds around are your own hurried pants for breath.

  You got out. That’s what matters.

  Your breathing goes back to normal, but the scene plays over and over when you close your eyes. Hamish being cut into chunks by the blast in front of you. After a little while, it stops being a horrid event and just becomes another gruesome memory.

  END.

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  26.18

  You unravel the scroll and hold it up to the light filtering in through the tent door flap, squinting to read the squashed annotations written around the blueprints. Your initial guesswork was correct. It’s the instructions for how to build and maintain a huge balloon, powered by fire. If it works, which everything in the plans suggest that it will, then it could be a very dangerous thing to have around.

  You could take them for yourself or destroy them. But then again, you did say that you would take them back to the other raider camp, and there might be a nice reward for you if you do. Is it worth it? You chew your lip as you decide, but you can tell from the noise outside that you need to make a decision quickly.

  Take them back to the other camp – Turn to 26.19.

  * * *

  Destroy them – Turn to 26.20.

  * * *

  Take them for yourself – Turn to 26.23.

  26.18a

  With a dawning horror, you realise you don’t only recognise the blueprint, you recognise the actual machine as well. You’ve seen this in another raider camp – and you know that it works. If either side manages to build one of these, they’ll have dominance of the air. Who knows how much chaos they would rain down on innocent people, just trying to live their lives?

  You could take them for yourself, or destroy them. Either of those options might be the right thing to do, to keep them out of raider hands. But then again, you did say that you would take them back to the other raider camp, and there might be a nice reward for you if you do. Is it worth it? You chew your lip as you decide, but you know from the noise outside that you need to make a decision quickly.

  Take them back to the other camp – Turn to 26.19.

  * * *

  Destroy them – Turn to 26.20.

  * * *

  Take them for yourself – Turn to 26.23.

  26.19

  You said you’d take these prints back to the raider camp, so that’s what you’ll do. You tuck them deep in your pack and head out the way you came.

  You get back to the man’s camp by reversing the route you came, climbing the hill and crawling past the battlefield. A bullet whizzes over your head and you’re not sure if it’s because a gunman saw you or if it was just a stray. You don’t want to stick around to find out, so you increase your speed, the buttons on your coat digging up clumps of grass in your haste.

  You get back to the camp in far less time than it took you to get to the other side. The soldiers must have been told you were coming, because nobody stops you as you traverse the now bootprint-muddied ground and go back to the tent.

  The boss grins when he sees you and takes the blueprints from you greedily, scanning them over and clapping a huge hand on your back in congratulations.

  “Well done, friend. You’ve done us a great service today. Help yourself to whatever you want from the box over there.” He gestures to where a huge box lies in the corner of the room, partially open and glistening on the inside. “What they didn’t want when we tried to negotiate for these. Well, look who’s laughing now…”

  He chuckles to himself as you open the lid. Inside is tons of jewellery, slightly dirty but still valuable gold. You don’t have much need for it, and neither will anyone who you come across, you suspect – but you dip your hand in and take a palmful out, tucking it into your pack.

  “Does this mean you’ll stop the fighting?” you ask. The man seems to remember you’re there and turns to you. You don’t like the smile on his face.

  “We’ll see,” he replies, going back to the blueprints.

  You feel a bit unsettled at his answer but don’t push it. Instead, you excuse yourself. He doesn’t seem to care where you go now he’s got what he came for. You don’t look back as you scurry out of the tent, leaving the camp and trying not to look back. You hope you’ve done the right thing, but you don’t want to stick around to see what happens next.

  END.

  Add Jewellery (O.17) to your inventory.

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/>   26.20

  You fold the blueprints in half and rip them, then do the same again. Each time you make the pieces smaller and smaller. You hope this is the only copy that they have. Even if it isn’t, it means there’s one less of them in the world, so you know that you’re doing a good thing.

  Keeping raiders out of the sky can’t be a bad idea.

  When the blueprints are in tiny shreds, you shove them into your pockets and bolt out of the tent. Luckily, the guards haven’t come back from the battlefield yet so you can flee without anyone noticing or firing after you. You don’t let up your pace. Instead, you keep on running until you can no longer hear the sounds of battle behind you.

  That night, when you make camp, you throw the leftover shreds onto your fire and watch them crinkle and burn. The ash swirls in the air and you know without a doubt that you’ve done the right thing.

  END.

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  26.21

  The woman rolls her eyes at your answer, clearly unimpressed.

  “So you thought you’d get involved in a turf war for what? Fun?”

  “No. I honestly just wanted to help.”

  It’s as she’s taking you in that she spots the badge on your coat, the insignia marking you as an outsider. Her breath jumps in her throat in what you assume to be some sort of half-hearted laugh.

  “I see. You’re one of those.”

  She gives a flippant gesture to her guard and they remove the spear that’s been aimed at your spine. You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

  “There’s no place for you here, outsider. You’d be wise to remember that next time. Leave here, and don’t come back.”

  You turn around and walk quickly away from her tent. You’re shaken, yes, but unscathed – you can’t help but think that someone is looking out for you. You touch your badge and thank the stars quietly as you leave.

  END.

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  26.22

  The woman snorts at your answer. Her mirth sends a shiver down your back.

  “The ‘right thing’ is a myth. You’re a fool if you believe in it.”

  She takes a long moment to study you before sighing.

  “But you did help my people, and for that I’m thankful. I’ll let you go. This time.”

  She gives a flippant gesture to her guard and they remove the spear that’s been aimed at your spine. You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

  “There’s no place for you here, outsider. You’d be wise to remember that next time. Leave here and don’t come back.”

  You turn around and walk quickly away from her tent. You’re shaken, yes, but unscathed – you can’t help but think that someone is looking out for you. You touch your badge and thank the stars quietly as you leave.

  END.

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  26.23

  You shove the blueprints into your pack and run. Luckily, the guards haven’t returned to their posts outside of the tent, so you aren’t pursued or called to stop. You don’t slow down until you’re far away from the camp and you can no longer hear the fighting. Even then, you push on for a couple more miles just to make sure there’s as much distance as possible.

  When you build your camp that night – a small fire, tucked away in a thicket of trees – you take the plans out and study them once again. This machine really does look dangerous, but if you get it into the hands of your group maybe it can be used for good. You could cover far more land for exploration if you were flying, and you wouldn’t have to deal with all the troublemakers on the ground either. You feel proud of yourself and fall asleep that night dreaming of flying amongst the stars.

  END.

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  Chapter 27

  The Aftermath

  27.1

  The battlefield is quiet now. Still. Well, stiller than when there were hundreds of people warring on it. All that’s left are corpses, their skin pallid as they decay, abandoned where they fell, as nobody bothered to clear this place when the fight was done. There are also those pilfering from them.

  A few of the scavengers raise their heads as you wander onto the empty battlefield. They don’t bother locking eyes with you. When they see you’re dressed neither as a raider nor as a member of their group, they ignore you and get on with their work, turning over bodies to rifle through their pockets.

  It seems a little bit… cruel. Disrespectful, really. You know the dead are all raiders, and it’s likely they didn’t cause these people anything but trouble, but you still feel uncomfortable knowing they’re just using their bodies as loot bags. They were people, after all. They deserve some sort of proper burial.

  Then again, you suppose, they were probably bad people. Isn’t it worth stripping them of anything useful, now that they’re dead? It’s not like they’re going to need it now.

  You sigh and look around. A bird is perched on one of the corpses. You stare into its beady, black eyes before it takes flight.

  Look through the corpses – Turn to 27.2.

  * * *

  Look for survivors – Turn to 27.3.

  * * *

  Talk to the scavengers – Turn to 27.4.

  27.2

  There are enough bodies on this battlefield that you can look without causing the other scavengers any trouble. You squat down next to the nearest body and begin to rummage through whatever pockets they have – one on each trouser leg, and a few on a waistcoat he had strapped on. It’s an awkward thing to do; you have to manoeuvre his body to access his front pockets. His body is heavy and flops around as you move him.

  When he’s on his back, you get a good look at his face. He’s young, only about seventeen. His wide eyes are looking blankly into the sky. Before you go through his belongings, you shut them. It’s the least you can do. You can’t help but be struck with the strangeness of how small and young he is, and yet how much he weighs.

  There’s nothing in his pockets but lint, unfortunately. Looks like he’s already been stripped of anything valuable. You leave his body and go on to the next one.

  You get through about seven people before you find anything. You feel a bit bad as you go, almost like you’re desecrating their bodies, but each time you leave them as neatly as you can and shut their eyes. It’s something, you suppose. Something to make them seem more peaceful.

  A woman has a belt, a thick leather thing with a built-in pocket. It was hidden in her skirts when she fell on the battlefield. You try not to look at the bullet holes in her upper torso and instead concentrate on what loot she has.

  There’s a piece of paper wrapped around a small capsule. There’s something scribbled on the paper in the Old World’s language.

  Read the note – Turn to 27.5, Needs Old World Language.

  * * *

  Identify the device – Turn to 27.6, Needs Chemistry.

  * * *

  Ask for help to identify the items – Turn to 27.7.

  * * *

  Lay all the bodies you can to rest – Turn to 27.8.

  27.3

  You head towards one of the bodies and turn it over. From the unresponsive weight in your arms, you know this person is dead. You’re met with the face of a young woman, about twenty. Her pale blue eyes stare blankly into the cloudless sky, her mouth hanging open a little. You know it will be fruitless, but you place two fingers over her neck to try to find a pulse.

  Nothing.

  You set her down and close her eyes. You move on to the next body, but you know even before you get there that you’ll have the same result. Nobody here who took part in the fight is alive.

  Well, except for you.

  You stop after the third body. It’s too difficult to
keep going when you know what you’ll find.

  You look around this sea of death.

  Look through the pockets of the corpses – Turn to 27.2.

  * * *

  Lay all the bodies you can to rest – Turn to 27.8.

  27.4

  You cross over towards the scavengers. They stop what they’re doing as you approach, a couple of hushed words being hissed before they turn to look at you with unfriendly eyes.

  “Hello,” you say, lamely. There’s a woman towards the front of the group, older than the rest of them, grey hair hanging down in clumped locks. You assume she’s the leader; at least, she’s the one who answers you.