by Quil Carter
I nodded and took the radio from him, then I put it into my overcoat pocket. “I won’t be far. Yell at me if you need anything.”
Perish disappeared into the dark cistern, his boots echoing when they smacked against the floor of the sewer. I let him do his exploring and began to explore a bit on my own. My natural curiosity had me gravitating towards a large building I could see near to the left of the apartments. It seemed to be an industrial building of some sort, and that could mean newer material for the workers to use. The less material that had to be brought here from Skyfall, the less the cost, and as councilman of Skyfall… I was always looking to save the Crown a few bucks.
I walked down the road, like all old pavement this one was cracked to excess, the slabs of road rising up out of the ground and folding into each other, like someone had pushed a bunch of puzzle pieces together with no regard for their proper places. The terrain made it impossible for any vehicles to go down. It even made walking on it challenging.
I stood up on a slab of pavement that had risen out of the ground like some homage to Pride Rock, and shielded my eyes with my hand to take a better look around. There was an intersection half a block up that had bumper to bumper vehicles, I’d have to climb over it, it seemed, and several telephone and electricity poles that had bent the knee over the years. I decided to get started, since I did want to check out that building, and began to climb up the uneven concrete to get to my destination.
I froze when my hearing, at its full strength with the lack of audible stimulus around me, picked up the sound of a racing heartbeat. At first, I was worried, but my education pinned this heartbeat as being from a prey animal, smaller than I was but not much. I pinpointed the direction it was coming from, and peered into a park covered in black trees that I’d just approached.
How fascinating! It was an irradiated deer. This must be one of Perish’s released animals. The young buck was standing amongst the trees, a modest patch of yellow grass growing between its hooves. It was an ugly creature, its grey hairless skin scabby and covered in sores. It had milky white eyes as well, and the antlers growing from its skull were twisted and tangled, a creature more suited for Jack’s dark imagination than for real life.
Or at least that’s what the case had been before the Fallocaust. Now a regular deer, the serene tan creatures that gazed cautiously at you with soft brown eyes, would’ve been the animal that was alien and out of place.
I wonder what generation it was? I’d have to ask Perish so we could get an idea just how successful the radanimal were at repopulating. I was currently studying science and medicine, not so much animal splicing or even earth science, but it was a subject I looked forward to studying in my future.
One thing was for sure, this was no first generation. Perish chipped all of his splices before releasing them into the wild, and this one had obviously suffered the ill effects of radiation.
“I won’t hurt you,” I said to the deer as I walked past him. “I don’t believe you would taste that good anyway. Would you?”
The deer said nothing, of course. We both watched each other until the deer disappeared behind me, and I continued on to the blue building. It was now close enough for me to see the broken glass windows that framed two grey metal doors.
And something else too… As I approached I realized there had been a sign on the side of the building, one that had been made up by individual letters. The letters themselves could be seen on the ground, now almost entirely consumed by ash and dust, but the outlines were visible and they read New West Metals. This was excellent. My hunch was right; this would be a perfect area to salvage materials for the lab.
There was a metal fence that had, at one time, closed in this area, but I easily stepped over it. I made a racket however, which I didn’t like, but I was more than just modestly armed, so I didn’t think anything of it.
Wow, there were bars on the windows of these buildings too. I suppose at a time of war people may have been trying to steal their material, or perhaps in the later years the Government themselves took control of it. There were signs of military presence all over this city: sandbags piled up in the streets for traffic stops, military vehicles now covered in dust so thick the windows were impossible to see through, and canvases and tarps, ruins now, but had once been erected to house the military personnel in charge of whatever it was they were trying to do.
I was just wondering if they had all been killed instantly, when I spotted a skeleton leaning up against the blue building, the person’s clothing now only grey shreds of cloth that clung tightly to bleached white bones. I wasn’t sure if this was pre-Fallocaust or post. Were there still skeletons in the greywastes from that time? I suppose there must be, but a lot of them I’d wager had been consumed and scattered at some time or another, either by greywasters, or the rats, ravers, and radanimals that scoured the greywastes before the invention of the Geigerchip.
I walked past the skeleton and tried to find the building’s entrance. If this was a warehouse, there should be some large metal rolling doors or something of that magnitude. I could already see stacks of metal beside skeletonized 4x4 trucks, so I knew I was in the right–
Suddenly a high pitch shriek pierced the air like an arrow. I looked in the direction of the scream, my heart jumping into my throat, and realized it was coming in the direction that I myself had just been.
Then I saw a grey figure run out of the black trees and onto the uneven street. It was the deer, and as I watched it I saw the desperate animal struggle to maintain footing on the cracked pavement.
But why did it scream out? Had Perish shot it?
The answer to this question was made clear only seconds after, and it made me wish I hadn’t even asked it.
Because while I was watching the deer attempt to navigate the rough terrain, I saw a second creature burst out of the black trees in pursuit of the deer… a creature that I had never before seen in my life.
It was… a dog, but an alarmingly large one. Like the deer, its skin was grey and scabby, its pointed haunches rising and falling as it stalked towards the frightened animal. The mass of this creature was terrifying, as it raised its head to get the prey in its vision, I realized with a gripped horror that its head was high enough for it to look over the vehicle it was standing behind.
No, this was no dog… it was a wolf. That was an irradiated fucking wolf.
I backed away from the scene until I was hidden behind a rusted truck. I pulled out my radio and raised it to my mouth, and as I peeked through the gaps in the falling apart vehicle, I whispered into it. “Don’t reply…” I said quietly. “There’s a giant irradiated wolf, north of that street the Falconer is parked in front of. I’m going to need help getting back to the plane.”
I held my breath, my eyes fixed like laser beams on the wolf. It was standing in front of the car now, not behind it, and the deer was frozen on the Pride Rock slab I myself had just been on not half an hour before.
“What was that, Elish? I didn’t catch that.”
The wolf’s head snapped towards me, and I saw its ears peel back and flatten against its skull.
Oh fuck.
I reached behind my shoulder and grabbed the assault rifle, the paralysis in my chest choking the breath in my lungs. While I brought it to my front, I saw the wolf creature begin to slowly walk towards me, the deer it was stalking a fleeting blur as it darted away.
“Elish? Can you hear me?”
“Shut the hell up, Perish!” I hissed, even though he couldn’t hear me. I held the gun in my shaky hands, pointed it towards the dog, and pressed down on the trigger as I braced my legs for the kickback.
The sound of the gunfire cracked the air like a snapping whip, beside the dog there was an explosion of grey debris as the bullet missed its mark. The fucking gun wasn’t on automatic. I needed it on–
The wolf, its milky eyes shining brightly against its skin, began to run towards me, the force of its stride kicking up dust behind it. I swore,
my mind flinging me headfirst into panic mode, and I squeezed the trigger again.
Another snap of gunfire. The hairless wolf stumbled as the bullet hit its haunches, an explosion of red mixing in with the dust that was following behind it like a rooster tail. It then fell forward, face planting into the ground with a dog-like yelp.
But just as I breathed a sigh of relief, I was suddenly pulled off of my feet. I slammed down onto the ground, my foot being shaken and thrown around like I was a fish who’d bit the lure, and as I struggled to wrench my foot from whatever had held it… I heard a growled snarl.
I looked behind me… and saw a second wolf with my foot in its huge jaws, its white teeth piercing the leather of my boots enough for only a splinter of white to be seen. The wolf was shaking its head back and forth as it snarled and growled, the canine’s gigantic presence now fully realized with it only inches away from me.
That dog’s head could come up to my god damn chest. It was huge, its paws the size of my hands, and it was easily dragging me down the road as it tried to rip my foot from my leg.
Where were my god damn chimera instincts? Why wasn’t I fighting this? I was frozen, my gun useless beside me, right next to my balls and my wits.
Then a splinter of hope. The wolf released my boot for a moment and I managed to pull my foot away from its jaws. I scrambled to my feet and faced it, and the two of us stared each other down.
I knew I was finished when I saw the another one, a black one, slink out of an alleyway to my left. Its head was low, its ears back, and it was growling at me in such a baritone tone, my chest was shaking as if the growl was being made by an amplifier.
Another fucking growl; I turned around and saw the one I’d injured. It was behind me with blood dripping down its leathery skin. They were all circling me now. I kept spinning around, not wanting my back to be to any of them, and while I whirled around like the prey I was, their tongues hung out as if they were smiling, though the growls never stopped vibrating my rib cage.
Then, just as I spun to face the first one that had attacked me, there was a hard impact on my back and I was thrown to the ground. I managed a startled gasp, before feeling a pressure on my head and neck.
Perish screamed my name in the distance.
But he was too far away to help me now. Any moment I’d feel those jaws close around my head, and I would go to a place where even Silas couldn’t reach me.
This was it. Was this it?
Suddenly I heard a crack of gunfire, an echoing snap that bounced off of the buildings that surrounded me. A shrieking yelp immediately followed, and the wolf that was on my back fell on top of me.
A second gunshot went off above my head, and with that, another one of the mutated wolves fell to the ground in front of me. Blood splattered on my face as the head smacked against the ground, the skull close enough that I could see the chunks of brains mixed in with the blood pouring from its blown off skull.
The third gunshot was expected, and though I couldn’t see it, I heard the wolf yelp and fall. I tried to get up then, to see just who was sniping these wolves, but the weight of the beast had me pinned underneath its carcass.
“Elish!” Perish yelled, panic in his voice. I can only imagine what he’d face if he had to confess to Silas that he’d taken me to Irontowers and I was killed. “Elish!”
I tried to gasp that I was fine, but the pressure of the wolf on my back made me barely able to breathe let alone yell out. But soon I was hearing Perish’s boots hit pavement, and then his ragged breath.
Perish pushed the dog off of me with a grunt. “Shit… shit, boy, tell me that’s not your blood?”
Wait. He wasn’t usually that rough with his speech… Was it him? After all these years? “It’s not. I don’t think,” I gasped. I wanted to call him on his switch in voice, investigate more if it was him, the old Perish, but there was too much going on. This was not the place; this was not the time.
Perish helped me on my feet and I started looking around the buildings. “There’s someone else here. They sniped all three.” I looked down at the carcasses and saw perfect headshots on each of them.
Perish paled, his icy blue eyes flickering around. His face then tensed. I believe… the old Perish was gone already. “They have no loyalty to us,” he whispered. “We need to get back to the plane. Now.” He picked up my assault rifle, still looking cautiously in every direction. “Now, Elish. Run.”
Well, I wasn’t going to question him. I wanted to get the fuck out of here as quickly as possible. I sprinted with Perish to the plane, and with my heart bruising my ribcage, we jumped into the plane and closed the door.
“What the fuck were those?” I snapped at Perish when we were safely high in the air. I was dousing my feet in antiseptic. I had several puncture wounds on the foot the wolf had bitten, and some claw marks on my back that were already starting to hurt like a bitch.
“Ah… deacons,” Perish said with a nervous laugh. “Aren’t they beautiful? They’re actually natural which is fascinating… but, ah, I’ve been selectively breeding them to make them bigger.”
I stared at Perish. “Why!?” I exclaimed throwing my hands into the air.
Perish looked back and shrugged. “I thought it would be cool to see.”
I groaned and wiped my hands down my face, the alcoholic smell of the antiseptic flooding my nostrils. I glanced at the window in front of me, Skyfall’s skyscrapers breaking through the haze to become detailed enough for me to see their windows. Now that I’d gotten a chance to retrieve my heart from the side of the blue building, another question had made itself known in my head.
“Who the hell sniped the deacons though?” I asked, turning to Perish with a confused look. “They saved my life… whoever they were.”
Perish’s brow knitted. “I thought that perhaps greywaster immigrants who got turned away may be living there, but we never really cared enough to look. Perhaps Skyfall defectors who didn’t really make it that far? I’m not sure, either way… they had a good enough heart to save you. Most greywasters I know would’ve sniped you after for your meat.”
That was true… “Maybe I’ll come back in a few weeks with some thiens… reward them or something,” I said. I began to bandage my wound with some gauze and a tenser bandage. The last thing I planned on doing was getting Liam involved in this. He’d have to go to Silas or risk punishment. The less people who knew about this adventure the better, Finn was already going to have kittens once I told him. “You know, getting the locals on our side would be good once the lab starts to be built. Perhaps we’re off to a good start with them.”
“You’re so diplomatic,” Perish said with a chuckle. “I’d rather shoot them, but you can do as you will.” He glanced down, there was water underneath us now. “Now not a word to Silas about you almost getting eaten. I remember what happened to the last man who took you out to the greywastes.”
Yes, the old Perish was gone. But… had I even seen him in the first place? Perhaps Perish was just in the moment and speaking differently.
I hadn’t seen the old Perish since my coding had been corrected. I didn’t know why. There were lots of theories but, really, I had pushed those incidences out of my mind. I wouldn’t disobey Silas by helping Perish, and I didn’t want to be pushed into doing something that would make my master upset.
If this was going to start happening again… I would have to tell Silas.
But for now, I wouldn’t borrow trouble.
As expected, once filling Finn in on what had happened in Irontowers, I was beset with a look of horror. He didn’t let me live it down for the next several days, and had taken his clingy nature to a whole new level. Thankfully, telling Silas that I had twisted my ankle on a set of stairs had put any questions he’d had to rest, and I was able to hide the scratch marks on my back with my regular clothes. Our excursion to Irontowers remained my and Perish’s secret, however we were both putting together an application to manufacture a Skytech laboratory inside o
f the abandoned city. Yes, it could be a little dangerous considering the violent ecosystem that the abandoned city seemed to have created, but the materials nearby and Skyfall only being a several minute flight outweighed any dangers. And it wasn’t like the greywastes were free of danger either.
Perish and I were both planning on pitching our idea Sunday after dinner. Every Sunday was family dinner at Silas’s apartment, most of the time we all attended, and a good chunk of that time the fostered chimeras attended as well. Silas was usually in a good mood and after getting some drinks in him… well, it would be a good time to run the idea by him.
“And it’s Sunday request day too!” Artemis said excitedly, referring to a yearly thing that Silas had implemented. If you were over ten, once a year you got to request a special item for Dek’ko to start mass producing. Silas denied them sometimes, but it was how Nero finally got Lucky Charms back.
It had been five days since my adventure in Irontowers with Perish. I was still limping, but had borrowed a cane from Garrett to help me with my typical Skyfall duties. Today I was touring the Dek’ko Agricultural Skyscraper or the D.A.S with the younger chimeras. Apollo was going to be replacing Garrett eventually as President of Dek’ko and Garrett would then transition to be the president of Skytech. Perish was currently president but in name only, Skytech was mostly run by the council and Silas. Perish was best used in the laboratory, not doing the tedious day-to-day errands and meetings required for the president, but Silas had insisted on family members being the heads of the major corporations in the world.
Apollo and Artemis had been created solely to help run Skyfall and both twins were showing all the proper characteristics we would want to see in a future leader. They were hyper intelligent, both already mastering the violin and piano respectfully, and were versed enough on Latin to hold conversations with Silas and I. Not to mention their personalities were on point too, both boys were calm and obedient young men, with a thirst to learn and an artistic ability that taught them patience.
