by JournalStone
“Yes,” she agreed, and then her shoulders sagged. “But skypers can’t hide anymore, not now.”
“The firestorms can’t have affected you that much, not in your scraper,” he said. “Even if they have, the lava fields are always spreading. They’ll settle down eventually and the clouds will thin out again.”
She gave him a curious look. “You don’t know where the fire clouds come from do you? Janitor Carlos said that scavengers don’t understand about the storms.”
“The fields make the clouds. Everyone knows that.”
“Then everyone is wrong,” Lina said firmly. “The power plant produces the fire clouds and it is the reason the storms are getting worse. The plant has drilled too deep, the crust is failing.”
“Is that so?” Colton grinned, amused by the skyper’s bizarre superstitions. “Okay, I’ll bite. What exactly is a power plant?”
She didn’t return his smile. “You think I’m making this up?”
He shrugged, still grinning.
“Well, then let me tell you something else. There is no World Wall.”
“Not to call you a liar Lina, but we could see the wall clear enough from the Maze.”
“But it’s not a wall,” she insisted. “It’s a cliff, one that circles the entire city.”
“A cliff,” echoed Colton, with just a touch of sarcasm. “Who knew?”
“I’m telling you the truth. Look.”
Brushing the soot around her feet into a pile, she created a small mound.
“This is the city,” she said. Putting her finger in the center, she made a small impression. “This is the power plant, right in the center of the lava fields.”
Colton rolled his eyes but decided to play along with her little game. At the very least, it kept his mind off the reavers. “Okay. So why doesn’t the plant melt?”
“I don’t think it can. Janitor Carlos said it was a thing of the old world, made to bring up the heat of the earth to create power for the ancients. No fire can harm it, but it is dying.”
“How do you know that?”
“You can see the smokestacks from my scraper,” she answered. “Three weeks ago there were seven, all of them wider than my scraper, spitting black fire clouds all day long. After the eruptions two weeks ago, there were only three.”
“What happened to the others?”
She pushed two fingers into the soot. “They sank into the clouds, and that’s when the fire clouds began to get worse.” Drawing up her fingers she made a fist and pushed it into the mound. “After that, scrapers near the fields began to sink, one by one. That’s when Carlos realized the plant had finally dug too deep. It has cut a hole so vast and hot the fields are spreading out like water from a tapped spring.”
He wanted to laugh but found he couldn’t as he remembered his den’s hunting grounds sinking slowly into the hot mires of the spreading fields.
“I still don’t understand what that has to do with the World Wall. Why do you call it a cliff?”
“The Plant has been digging a long time. Long ago it caused a massive earthquake that dropped the entire city into a vast sinkhole. There is no World Wall Colton. We are living in a hole in the ground, one that’s going to get very hot, very soon.”
He snorted but was secretly glad to find a flaw in the girl’s logic. Lina scowled at him but he raised a hand to forestall any argument.
“No offense Lina, but the World Wall is no cliff. It’s a barrier that was built to protect us during the Great War. I have seen the World Gate that leads outside, myself.”
“You’ve see the Gate?” she asked sharply. “What does it look like? Have you opened it?”
“No one has,” he replied. He thought of Odin and his many lectures concerning the wastelands beyond the city. “Nothing survives beyond the Gate, not even air. The world is dead.”
Undeterred, she leaned closer to him. “Janitor Carlos said after the first great earthquake struck, many of the ancients died. Those who survived created a machine at the foot of the World Wall, a box that could carry people to safety. The box had golden doors, and rises like an eagle to the top of the Wall.”
“A golden box that flies people to safety? Do you hear yourself?”
She drew her fist from the soot, gesturing to the impression left behind. “If you were an insect down in that soot, what would you see? Would you see the cliffs all around you? Would you recognize them for what they were?”
He couldn’t suppress a shiver. “No,” he said softy. “No. I’d see walls.”
The shaft trembled and the soot collapsed in on itself, burying the hollow in burnt darkness.
Colton met Lina’s eyes, seeing in them the certainty behind her words.
Could it be true? What if Odin, teacher of scavengers and guardian of the World Gate was wrong? What if the Gate wasn’t a gate at all?
The trembling ceased and Lina sat down the floor. “Carlos was going to lead us to the machine. But we only just reached the Maze when the reavers found us. We fought but there were so many. Carlos...the reavers...He told everyone to run. I...I….”
“You were separated from the others,” Colton said, hearing the pain in her voice and already knowing where her tale would lead. “The reavers caught up with her later.”
“In a stairwell,” Lina said miserably. “I left the others behind. And the reavers found me anyway.”
Guilt cut into him like a dull knife and for a moment, the face of a small boy superimposed itself over Lina’s own. He blinked and the apparition faded.
“It wasn’t your fault,” he said roughly, unsure if he was speaking to her or himself. “There was nothing you could do.”
“I should have tried.”
Perhaps drawn by her tears, Rags moved closer to Lina and sniffed gently at her greasy long hair. She slapped him on the nose.
“Stop it!”
Rags jerked back and threw Colton an aggrieved look.
“You’re not afraid of him. That’s rare. Are all skypers so brave?”
“We raised worlhound in the scrapers,” she said. “They protected us for as long as they could, when the reavers came,” she smiled apologetically and patted Rags’s head. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
Rags wet her cheek with his long black tongue.
She made a sour face and giggled.
“Alright, I give up,” Colton said. “I’ll bring you to the Gate. I don’t know if it’s your machine or not but we’ll find out together.”
She started to speak but then Rags’s ears pricked up and Colton waved her to silence.
A clanking scrape sounded from the hole in the wall. Someone was moving the plate, uncovering the tunnel.
“They’ve found us.” Rising from the floor, he helped Lina top her feet. “We have to go.”
They hurried down the shaft, Lina and Rags leading while Colton’s tin lit their way from the rear. They hadn’t gone far before the sounds of many shuffling feet pursued them.
“Faster,” he urged.
The shaft turned and they came to a door, its surface thick with grease and red corrosion. Ducking through the portal, Colton handed her the tin.
“What are you doing?”
“Slowing them down,” he replied.
He put his shoulder to the door but the rusted hinges resisted until Rags added his own significant bulk to the task. The door squealed shut and Colton quickly dropped the locking bar in place. No sooner had it clanged down than something struck it hard from the opposite side, denting the rusted metal.
A reaver shrieked and another dent joined the first.
Colton took back the tin. “It won’t hold long.”
She needed no further prompting and they ran on as reavers struck at the door behind them.
Suddenly, Lina skidded to a stop.
He was about to tell her to keep moving when he spied the oily sheen of raingrease in front of them. The shaft ahead was flooded.
The banging grew louder behind them, followe
d by the whining screech of tearing metal.
“We’re trapped,” Lina gasped.
Colton stared hard at the flooded shaft. “No, we’re not. I’m not going to die like a cornered lizard rat.” Setting down the burning tin well clear of the flammable pool, he stripped off his coat. “We’ll swim it.”
“We can’t. I . . .” her lips began to tremble. “What about Rags?”
“He’ll follow us, or he’ll fight his way out. Not even reavers want to mess with a cornered worlhound.”
Golden eyes fastened on the shaft behind, Rags growled as if in agreement.
“We don’t even know how far it goes,” she protested shrilly. “We’ll drown!”
“No we won’t.”
“I can’t swim, Colton!”
Stepping into the lukewarm pool, he offered her his hand. “I’ll help you.”
She backed away from him. “I can’t.”
“Lina!”
“I can’t!”
The screech of metal came again, louder than before.
Colton’s heart skipped a beat. The door wouldn’t hold much longer but clearly Lina wasn’t going to enter the raingrease of her own accord and forcing her in would only see them both drowned.
He ground his teeth in frustration. Why was she being so difficult? He wouldn’t even be in this mess if not for her. In fact, the longer he stuck with her, the more doom she brought down on him.
If she wanted to stay so badly, let her. He was not going to die for some homeless pup not even from his den.
“I’m sorry Colton,” Lina sobbed. “Please don’t go.”
Turning away, he waded deeper into the raingrease. But then he stopped as that frightened boy rose in his memory. His fingers tightened on his spear and he turned back to Lina.
No. Not again.
“Don’t worry Lina,” he said, climbing out of the pool. Never again. “I won’t.”
She stared down at her feet. “I thought....You’re not going to leave me?”
His hard expression softened. “You’re not the only one who lost their clan. My den was headed for the Wall too. The eruptions destroyed our water purifier and we were going to seek my old teacher, get Odin’s help in replacing it. Rags and I were scouting ahead when the reavers attacked. By the time I returned most were already dead. All who remained were a few children the reavers kept alive to bring back to their den.” his throat tightened and he cleared it noisily before going on. “A boy I knew spotted me as I watched from hiding. He was only four but he didn’t call out. As young and frightened as he was, he was a scavenger and knew not to give away my position.”
“Like I did.”
“Like you did,” Colton agreed without malice. “Had you kept silent I would have remained hiding, as I did then. And I would . . .” his eyes blurred with tears and he dashed them away. “I would have been twice as damned!”
She put a comforting hand on his arm. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was my decision. But I won’t leave another pup to the reavers. I’d rather die than live through that again.”
Lina glanced at the flooded shaft and licked her lips. “Do you really think we can make it?”
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly.
She slugged him hard in the shoulder. “You could have lied, you idiot.”
Up the shaft, something gave with a loud clang! A reaver shrieked.
Rags growl deepened and his golden eyes grew bright.
“Now or never,” Colton said to Lina. “Do we swim or fight?”
Reavers rushed from the darkness, scrambling along the walls, floor and ceiling like melted locusts.
Rags charged in, diving into the blistered ranks with a savage howl.
“We’d better not drown,” she said weakly.
He grabbed her hand, and together they splashed into the raingrease. “Hang on to my belt. And don’t swallow any of it.”
Lina seized his belt. “No problem.”
He whistled to Rags. “Get in here you mangy lizard!” he shouted, and then dived down into the wet darkness with Lina beside him.
He hit the floor belly-first, nearly expelling the air from his lungs. Tightening his lips, he clawed along the cracked floor, feeling his way through the oily murk. It was slow going and soon his lungs burned. He pushed on, Lina a dragging anchor at his waist. Colors flickered under his eyelids and his pulse pounded in his ears. His muscles grew leaden and his mind wandered to dreams of unseen reavers grabbing at his ankles. The shaft went on and on.
She was right. They were going to drown.
Colton surged up, breaking the surface with a wet scream of denial. Floundering in the muck he gulped down the rank but welcome air. She came up with him. Coughing and spitting, she leaned against his back.
“Told you...” she paused to spit more raingrease from her lips. “Told you we’d make it.”
Too exhausted to laugh, Colton examined the alcove around them. The walls, ferrocrete and metal, were marked with drawings of odd-looking beasts with long necks and spotted hides. He knew this place. It was close to the World Wall. A short corridor led away from the pool and the cracked ceiling bled dim sunlight.
Helping Lina out of the pool, he turned back to search the glistening surface for sign of Rags. “Where are you?” he muttered.
A bullet-shaped head broke the surface and Colton nearly swooned in relief. “You had me worried,” he scolded as the worlhound doggy paddled to shore. “I thought the reavers got you that time.”
Rags grunted as he climbed from the pool and then gave a violent shake, spraying raingrease everywhere.
Colton wiped his face clean and gave the worlhound a hard look. “We’re wet enough, thank you,” but then added, “glad you made it, Rags.”
Dropping to her knees, Lina scratched roughly at the worlhound’s ears. “Who’s a good worlhound that bites the nasty reavers?” she asked sweetly. “You are! Yes you are!”
Rags’s licked her face, replacing raingrease with saliva.
She giggled.
“Yuck,” Colton said. He glanced at the sky, noticing the darkening clouds through the cracks in the roof. “Another storm’s brewing.”
The floor trembled, dislodging soot and gravel from the ceiling in a dusty rain.
The earthquake lasted only moments but Colton frowned at black ripples it left in the pool. The tremors were worsening, growing more frequent, just like the storms.
“We better hurry,” he said, scarcely aware he spoke aloud. “Or there’ll be nothing by the time we reach your magic machine.”
Her eyes lit up. “You believe me?”
“I don’t know Lina,” he said. He took an empty tin from his pocket and filled it with raingrease. “But something is very wrong. I can feel it in my bones, can taste it in the air. I don’t know if the Gate is a savior machine. I doubt it. But I guess it doesn’t really matter anymore.”
Backing down away from the pool, he dribbled a line of raingrease on the floor behind him.
Lina followed him, squeezing excess muck from her vest as she walked. “What do you mean it doesn’t matter?”
“Even if Odin is right and the Gate leads to a wasteland, it’s no worse than staying here. The city is dying.”
Though she’d pointed out as much herself, Lina shivered at the words. “So we use the Gate?”
He nodded, still trailing raingrease as he walked. “Yes. The only problem is Odin has the key to the Gate.”
“Won’t he let us use it?”
“I’m not sure. I doubt it.” They came to a sharp turn in the passage and he peeked around the corner to make sure the way was clear before leading Lina around it. “But we need that key.”
Continuing the line of raingrease around the corner, he discarded the tin and knelt beside Rags. He whispered instructions to the worlhound, wishing he didn’t have to ask so much from his old friend.
Rags whined, nuzzling his neck.
“I know,” Colton said. Giving the w
orlhound a fierce hug before he stood. “But it’s the only chance we’ve got, Rags.”
With a whining grunt, Rags turned and ran down the hall.
“Where’s he going?” Lina eyed the line of raingrease curiously. “And what are you doing?”
“Rags is running an errand.” Taking out his flicker, he touched it to the grease and struck the action. Fire licked up, racing back toward the pool. “And I’m making sure the reavers don’t follow us this way.”
Bright light filled the passage and thunder rolled across the Maze.
* * *
They wove their way through a corridor cluttered with large sections of broken glass.
“Why wouldn’t Odin let us use the Gate?” asked Lina for the third time. She ducked beneath a horizon sheet of glass, staying well clear of the razor edge. “I thought you said he used to be your friend.”
“Odin was my teacher but he doesn’t have friends. He’s taught generations of scavengers, orphans like me mostly, showing us how to survive in the city before sending us out to find dens of our own.”
“Generations? Just how old is this guy?”
“Old. Very old, but stronger than a worlhound and faster than any man has a right to be.” his eyes grew distant and he added softy, “Sometimes I wonder if he’s a man at all.”
“What was that?”
“Nothing.”
The passage abruptly opened up ahead and Colton motioned for her to stay low behind him as he crept to the end of the corridor.
They’d reached the end of the Maze. Outside, a soot-floored clearing nestled at the base of World Wall. Flanked by hillocks of blackened stone, a gentle gravel slope climbed from the clearing to a pair of golden doors twice as tall as a man. The World Gate, pristine despite the passing of a thousand storms, its shining surface glowed with a pale light.
Colton searched for the palm-sized keyhole in the Gate. Though he knew where to look, it was too far to make out.
Lina’s face lit with excitement. “The machine,” she breathed. “Colton, we found it.”
She started to rise but her caught her arm.
“We are not alone,” he whispered.
She froze. “Reavers?” she asked fearfully.
His gaze swept the rocks taking only moments to spot movement among the slabs. He sniffed and was unsurprised by the faint odor of treated raingrease.
