by Jon Cronshaw
A fight breaks out between a man and a woman a few cars over to his left. He steps over a bloated corpse, half-rotten and stripped naked. Tiny sparks burn iridescent from the inside of cars — the firing-up of plez.
Reaching the scorched husk of a pickup truck, he leans against the twisted black metal frame and watches the dealers as they unload the van in the dying light. The enslaved kids carry crates to a heavily guarded truck, stumbling as dealers prod them with rifle-butts.
“What the hell do you want?” a voice asks.
Abel snaps to his left to be greeted by a rifle and a dealer wearing patched leather and a wolfish grin.
“Just looking to get some plez.” He raises his hands.
The dealer squints and tilts his head. “You don’t look like a plez-head,” he says, raising his rifle. “You trying to move in? I saw you dealing.”
Abel opens his mouth and closes it again.
“Give me the rest of your stash.”
“Don’t have any. I gave it away. It was an old friend.”
“Hand over your stash,” the man says firmly, clicking the safety of his rifle.
Abel spreads his hands wide. “I got nothing. Honest.”
“Don’t move.” The dealer pulls Abel’s jacket open and rummages through the pockets. “Open your bag.”
Abel crouches slowly, sliding the rucksack off his shoulders. He unfastens the zip, takes out the bottle and shows him the bag is empty.
The dealer looks Abel up and down for several seconds. “You want plez?”
Abel nods.
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
A throaty laugh erupts from the dealer. “You come here unarmed, you got nothing to trade, you give away your last plez, and then you expect me to believe that you’re here to score?”
Abel’s eyes widen as he bites down on his bottom lip.
“Wait here.”
The dealer swaggers away with the rifle slung over a shoulder. Abel watches the dealer approaching the slavers from the campervan, gesturing over to him. The dealers talk for several seconds. The male and female slavers take up their rifles and make their way briskly towards Abel.
Without hesitation, he turns and runs. Bullets fizz past him, sending sparks flying from vehicles all around. He ducks and weaves his head as he charges through the last of the cars. A few addicts try to block him, but he makes easy work of dodging them.
Pip runs at his side when he returns to the highway. The slavers still pursue him. Spit thickens in his mouth as the cold air burns his lungs. His pace slows to a jog as the highway slopes upwards towards the full moon. He trips and stumbles over scattered car parts, tree roots, and cracks in the asphalt. A branch scratches across his face.
He stops to catch his breath at the top of a hill, panting as his heart races and the pulse thunders through his head. Reaching into his rucksack, he retrieves the water bottle and takes a drink. The water burns like frost as he swallows. With trembling fingers, he reaches desperately for an apple hanging in the tree above. The apple sags against his grip, spraying sour juice across his face and hands, burning his raw fingers with an acidic bite. He curses, wiping his face with his sleeve. Eyes adjusting to the night, he locates another apple and tests it before twisting it from the branch. He backs up against the tree trunk and hides in the shadows. Taking a bite, he chews and makes a satisfied sigh, taking a moment to savour the crunch and sweetness, the rush of sugar, the sensation of something filling his belly. He takes another bite and looks back along the highway, towards the Grid, the curls of smoke death-black against the night sky. Pip is nowhere to be seen.
Though moving at a slower pace, the slavers continue their pursuit. When they pick up speed again, Abel heads east, following the highway as it winds towards the city. To the northeast, torches and bonfires of Trinity twinkle like constellations. Across the wastes, tiny sparks marking campfires and other settlements glow bright against the night.
He jogs past the sagging husks of cars and crumpled trucks as cables scratch against the asphalt, responding to the gusts of wind that rattle the branches of dead pines to his left. His feet burn with each step.
He catches a glimpse of Pip, emerging from a hunt with something squirming in her jaws. Looking behind him, he sees the slavers reaching the hill's brow. They shout to him, taunting him, but he can’t make out the words over the wind. He starts as a bullet rips through a car door to his right. Ducking his head, he rushes forward, dodging from left-to-right. His legs throb with each step as blisters sting against the soles of his feet.
When he reaches the trail leading to Trinity, he stops for several seconds, staring towards the settlement. He calls for Pip and waits until she emerges from a nearby bush.
“Not today,” he says. “Let’s keep on.”
The shouts come again and Abel runs. The woman cackles as one of them lets off a shot, the bullet tickling past his ear. “Damn it,” Abel cries.
He pushes himself in fits and starts, the survival instinct clashing with fatigue. Each pained breath comes sharp against his lungs.
“Down here,” he says, moving off the highway's edge. He scrambles down an embankment, his feet slipping against loose soil and tumbling stones. His jacket snags against a tree root. Pip waits for him at the bottom, her eyes glowing white against the pitch-blackness.
Feeling through the trees with his arms outstretched, he fumbles blindly in the dark, his hands barely protecting his face against low-hanging branches as he shoulders his way through the brush.
Exhausted, he hunches over, grips his knees, and vomits, chunks of half-digested apple erupting from his mouth, bilious, acidic. He spits away the foul taste and looks around him, listening in the dark for the sound of his pursuers, but all he hears are his own strained breaths and the rumbling of his stomach.
He gets to his knees and crawls along the ground, every movement a struggle as his muscles seize and burn. A sharp stone drives into the palm of his hand. Biting down, he suppresses the urge to call out, to scream, as the agony sweeps through his body. He curls himself into a ball.
Resigned, he crumbles.
18. The Shop
STIFF AND SORE, ABEL rolls onto his side and looks up at Pip. She hops on her forelegs and licks his face. “Hey, girl,” he says, sitting up and patting her on the ribs. She pushes her nose against his right cheek and hops back a few steps, her tail wagging.
The trees around him huddle in a dense and tightly-packed cluster. He brushes soil from his face, shaking the numbness from his arms. Staggering to his feet, a dull pain throbs along his thighs and neck. He takes the water bottle from his rucksack and squints as the first moments of sunlight shimmer across the eastern sky. “Damn it,” he mutters, unscrewing the cap and taking a drink.
He creeps towards the highway, cringing as twigs snap beneath his boots, wincing as a blister on the sole of his foot bursts, warm and oozing. Dropping to a prone position, he crawls forward, elbows tucked in, as he drags his way to the asphalt's edge. With a deep breath, he raises his head to see onto the highway, scanning for his pursuers, his head pounding with fear.
As the sun pokes up from beyond the city, the sky turns from purple to red, its reflection glistening in the shattered window of a wrecked car. Abel forces his body to stand, pushing against the cramp and hunger. The road lies empty and still. A torn plastic bag flaps against the rusting remains of the central barrier.
With the highway on his left, he heads towards the city. Car wrecks make way for dead pines and vast swathes of cratered earth. Dust gathers like snow-drifts against building foundations, their brickwork rendered smooth by the elements.
At points the highway disappears beneath a carpet of vegetation, as vines and bramble bushes twist across the asphalt.
He gathers blackberries, blowing dust away before tossing them into his mouth. He shivers at the rush of sugar and bitterness.
As he looks around for Pip, he stops as two figures emerge from the west. His m
outh dries and a cold sweat floods across his back. The man and woman from the Family draw near.
He turns and tries to run, his legs seizing as the muscles in his thighs and lower-back spasm and contract, his steps shambling, desperate, no better than a hobble. He grits his teeth, pushing against his body's protests.
A gunshot echoes from behind him as a rush of adrenaline surges through him. He races onto the asphalt and runs at full-speed, his agonised breaths clawing at his throat and lungs. He cries out, roaring through the pain as he zigzags between the shells of cars and trucks, desperate to find cover.
Taking a right turn, he limps off the highway and onto a familiar road. He looks over his shoulder to see his pursuers still gaining.
Cramp seizes his left thigh. He beats the muscles with the side of his fist, trying to tenderise them like a tough piece of meat.
Wrecked cars and shattered glass lie strewn along the road. Buildings rise from the soil — a twisted steel-framed structure, a three-storey brick building, passing-by in a blur.
He groans as his left foot drags behind him, the slavers closing in. The squat building where he found the quad bike stands ahead, silent. A lazy cloud of dust eddies by.
A bullet ricochets off the ground to his right, grazing his right leg, the bullet white hot as it skims along his flesh.
“Don’t move,” a man’s voice growls behind him.
Abel freezes.
“Hands on your head. Turn slowly.”
He lifts his hands to his head and turns to face the slavers, raising his chin as he meets their gaze. “Just get it over with.”
The woman lets out a sharp laugh and drops the aim of her rifle. Holding it at her side, she approaches Abel and grabs his face, digging her finger and thumb into his cheeks before spitting in his eye. “We’re not wasting any more ammo on you.” She releases her grip, turning to the man. “We are going to have some fun with this one.”
He tries to blink away the spittle hanging from the eyelashes over his right eye as a crooked smile creeps across the man’s face.
“Who are you?” the man asks.
“No one,” Abel shrugs.
“Then why you sniffing around our business?”
Abel shakes his head and wipes his eye with a forearm. “I don’t care about your damn business.”
“Keep your hands on your head,” the woman snarls.
The man takes aim with his rifle, pointing it at Abel’s face. “Where’s your partner?”
“She’s probably off hunting. I’ve not seen her for a few hours.”
The man and woman share a confused look. “There’s a woman as well?” the man asks.
Abel frowns. “What? No. I’m on about my dog.”
“Do not play games with us,” the woman says, approaching Abel. She knees him in the stomach and laughs as he falls to the ground.
“You mean the wizard?” Abel splutters, gripping his arms around his stomach.
“The black guy with the blue robes,” the man says.
Abel manages to look up. “I don’t know what happened to him. He left after one of you guys shot him. He took my stuff.”
“Do you know how much trouble you’ve caused us?” the woman asks.
“I just wanted to free those kids.”
A look of disgust flickers across the woman’s face. She spits in Abel’s face again and follows it up with a kick to his right shoulder. “Those kids are already dead,” she says. “Pathetic, worthless scum.” She shakes her head, her lip curling. “Worthless addicts.”
Abel bites his lip to stop himself from crying out with the pain as he wipes the spittle from his face again. “They’re still people.”
“I don’t have to listen to this.” The woman raises a boot and slams it down on the top of Abel’s head. This time, he cries out with a guttural scream. He falls to his side and curls into a ball, protecting his head with his arms clasped tight.
The kicks come sharp and fast, pummelling his back and sides, his body contorting and twisting with each strike. The assault is relentless.
There’s a gunshot. The kicking stops. A second gunshot is followed by a dull thud on the ground behind Abel.
Breathless, with blood oozing from his mouth and a gash on his forehead, he pushes himself up to a sitting position, eyes widening as he looks around. The man lies to his left in a pool of blood, a large hole gaping in his forehead like a third eye. The woman lies a few feet away, twisted and twitching as she faintly clucks out her dying breaths.
“What the hell?” Abel looks between the man and the woman. He bolts towards the lawnmower shop on his hands and knees, groaning. He reaches the shutters and leans against them, staring at the bodies as his wounds throb.
Motionless, save for the trembling, he leans his head back against the steel, closes his eyes, and waits for the gunman to find him.
The sun warms his body. He stirs at the sound of light footsteps. Slowly, he opens his eyes. A skinny girl wearing tattered clothes and gripping a rifle approaches the bodies. She’s no older than ten. They lock eyes with each other, and Abel reaches into his jacket for his pistol. The girl shakes her head and he stops. She eyes him up and down then turns her attention to the bodies without speaking, her shaggy blonde hair knotted and slick with grease. Taking the slavers’ rifles, she empties their pockets of ammunition. She heaves the woman’s backpack over her shoulder and goes as if to walk away. Hesitating, she turns back to the woman’s body and takes the leather jacket.
Abel watches, helpless and wide-eyed. “Thank you.”
The girl doesn’t respond as she leaves, disappearing into the ruins.
“Wait,” he says. But she is gone.
19. The Tin
ABEL STAGGERS FORWARD, scanning the trees and bushes for food. The city's deathly stench catches the wind, forcing him to gag, dry heaves bringing up nothing. Hunger tears at his stomach.
Catching his breath, he leans against the side of a car, his spit flavoured with bile. He pushes the filth out of his mouth, spluttering as it drops elastic to the ground, stringy and thick. With a sigh, he tries the car doors, all jammed shut. He climbs through the rear window and rolls clumsily onto the back seat, exposed springs jabbing into his flesh. He looks around, licking the dryness of his cracked lips, but finds nothing of use. He checks under the front seats, searching the foot-wells and forcing open the glovebox.
“Damn it,” he says, smacking the dashboard with the heel of his hand.
He climbs through the open windscreen and slides down the car's front. A jolt of pain strikes his feet when his boots hit the ground. He winces and curses.
“Here, girl,” he calls out. He tries to whistle.“Pip?”
He calls out again.
The wind stings his hands and burns his cheeks as junk cartwheels past him. He searches through more cars and climbs into the back of a dilapidated truck, its suspension groaning in protest when he searches the empty trailer and cabin.
The trees stand in rot. Gaunt branches clatter with each gust of wind. He pulls up his collar and hunches against the chill. Clammy sweat coats his body. His teeth chatter.
In the setting sun's dim light, he sees a shack through the trees — a tumbledown building constructed from wood and car parts, huddled in a clearing, surrounded by dead pines and barren soil. Trembling, he grips his hunting knife and approaches.
“Hello,” he calls, reaching for the door and opening it. Silence.
Waving his hand to clear the air, he reaches for his torch and steps inside. A rotten mattress rests next to a pile of animal bones. In the left-hand corner, a pile of dust-coated computer keyboards leans against the wall. He turns to leave and then spots a shelf to the door's right. On it stands a can of food.
Taking the tin, he feels the rust around its rim and frowns. He goes outside and gathers wood for a fire. The first drops of rain patter along the ground forming tiny blast craters in the soil. The rain drips in brown streaks along his hands, irritating his flesh.
&
nbsp; He returns to the shack for shelter, calling out for Pip before closing the door behind him.
When he pierces the tin with his hunting knife, he sniffs its contents and recoils at the stench of rot. He lobs the tin outside and crawls onto the mattress. Tears well in his eyes, and he sobs uncontrollably, his body shuddering with the pain of hunger as the cold presses against him and water leaks through the roof. He lies awake through the night until the storm abates, his clothes soaked with the chemical rain.
WHEN THE FIRST DOTS of sunlight reveal themselves like stars through the holes in the walls and roof, Abel sighs and forces himself to stand. His ears prick at a scratching from the other side of the door, accompanied by a high-pitched whine. Smiling, he darts to the door and flings it open to be greeted by Pip, a plump rat locked between her teeth. She drops the animal at his feet and hops back with her tail wagging.
He crouches on one knee and embraces her, stroking her head and patting her sides. “Good work, Pip,” he says, relieved. “Good work.”
Within half an hour, the campfire rages near the shack. Pip sleeps next to him, her tail batting against the ground in a slow, insistent rhythm. He takes the rat off the fire and bites into its cooked flesh, smiling at the sensation of warmth and food in his mouth, the taste of fat running down his throat. “Thanks, girl,” he whispers.
IT’S EARLY AFTERNOON when Abel reaches the entrance to the cave. The ravine glistens with streaks of orange and yellow light as the river winds below. Pip bounds on ahead into the darkness.
He follows the jagged line of the yawning cave entrance with his gaze before stepping inside. The air gets colder and fresher as he walks along the smooth stone, pawing at the wall to his right to find his way as a fungal glow penetrates the blackness.
He smiles at the running water as it gurgles and churns. Reaching the stream's edge, he takes off his jacket and boots and then removes the rest of his clothes until naked and shivering. He starts at the water’s icy bite against his feet, shuddering as he drops to his knees and splashes the water against his body, washing away the ground-in filth, the layers of sweat and grime.
