Meritorium (Meritropolis Book 2)

by Joel Ohman

  The rock crashed through teeth like a baseball through a window. A sound like broken glass was followed by a choking cough. Doubled over at the waist, eyes bugging out and spitting shards of bloody teeth onto the ground, the youth made a gagging sound, before expelling a smooth little object onto the ground.

  Sven darted past, into the pen, and was quickly lost among the roiling mass of bodies.

  Standing up a little straighter, Sven lowered his arms from around his chest. His pulse was pounding. He chanced a look back, but it appeared as if a few of Marta’s men were clustering around the youth, now sunk to his knees. The men did nothing but laugh.

  Sven turned his head back, melting into the center of the crowded pen. A mean little sneer stretched up the corner of his mouth.

  Sven felt it was true: action did breed confidence.

  And sometimes worse.

  ***

  A thick-fingered hand probed the inside of Charley’s mouth, tapping his teeth and roughly peeling his lips back to inspect his gums. If he could have bitten down, he would have, but the other hand kept a wooden rod firmly stuffed in his mouth so that his teeth couldn’t meet. There was also the matter of his chained hands, ankles, and neck. The latter of which was firmly grasped by an aggressive dentist to keep his head still. Charley was sure this was not this guy’s first time giving a forced dental exam.

  “Very good, very good indeed.” The man jerked the rod from Charley’s mouth and moved back, not exactly hurriedly, but quite precisely. Charley gasped in a breath. The man was just out of range for a bite, probably a lesson learned long ago. But at least Charley was finally right side up, although now bent forward over some kind of wooden block and outside of the building he had been held in and now in what looked to be an open barnyard area.

  “Let’s see, any pain, soreness? Besides the usual, of course.” He looked at Charley’s chains and laughed, wrinkling up his leathery face. “Ah, sorry. That never gets old with you new guys.”

  Charley moved his jaw from side to side, trying to work out the soreness.

  “Eh, sorry about that. Has to be done, though, you know?” He lifted his grey eyebrows inquisitively. “So, any handicaps, disabilities, chronic health issues?”

  “Why don’t you take these chains off of me, and I can perform a physical fitness test for you,” Charley said evenly.

  “Spunk! I like it!” he said. “It appears you are quite fine indeed. Never hurts to ask, though.” He grinned, causing his old face to lose twenty years. “I think we’ll forego the physical fitness test.”

  Charley grunted.

  The man packed away his few dental instruments and turned to leave.

  “Wait!” Charley called. “Where are my friends?”

  The man turned around. “They’ll be joining you soon,” he said, his eyes surprisingly warm. “The big one required some extra sedative earlier, so transportation might take a little longer. The younger one is on his way, and that guy who keeps acting like he’s in charge—”

  Charley couldn’t hold back a smirk. “Orson.”

  “Yeah, that’s the one. Great teeth.” He shifted his bag of tools from one hand to another. “Anyway, they’ll all be out shortly.” He paused, and then chuckled. “Your friends, that is, not Orson’s teeth. It’d be a crime to remove those pearly whites.”

  Charley snorted at the thought of Orson, toothless. “Right, okay.”

  “The auction will start pretty soon, and you guys are all checked out and shipshape. Well, slave-shape.” He looked closely at Charley and shrugged. “It is what it is, young man. I think you’ll do alright, if you’ve got some friends to keep you going. The lot of you look like you can handle yourselves in the Venatio—might even win a prize or two.”

  Charley almost laughed out loud at the thought of Orson as his friend. The absurdity of his predicament, now a slave and with Orson as his friend, caused Charley to find himself in a very strange mood. Surprisingly, he met the older man’s smile with one of his own.

  “See, that’s the spirit. You’ll do just fine.” His face grew serious. “Just be prepared to fight. Some of those combos in the Venatio are no laughing matter.”

  He lifted his bag in farewell and turned to go. “Well, I’ll be off. I might just be cheering you and your fellows on in the amphitheater in a couple days—maybe even put some money on the big fella. Good luck.”

  Charley watched him walk away, his bag swinging carefree, the faint tone of a whistle floating back on the breeze. Charley rested his chin on the wooden block.

  “So, how do your teeth look?”

  Charley turned his head to see Hank being led up, his chains fastened to the metal loops bolted onto the same wooden platform. “Not as good as Orson’s, apparently.”

  Hank snorted. “Not a surprise there. I’ve never seen a man fuss and primp over his appearance as much as him.”

  A jangle of chains caused both Charley and Hank to turn and see Orson led up behind them.

  Orson gave a haughty look in Hank’s direction. “Maybe if you paid more attention to your hygiene, you wouldn’t be mistaken for a filthy beast and used for bait when we’re hunting.”

  “Whatever.” Hank turned his head away.

  Charley looked at Orson. “Where’s Grig—”

  “He’s coming, he’s fine, et cetera, et cetera,” Orson interrupted, lifting a chained hand and shaking his black glossy locks with a toss of his head. “I’m fine, too. Thanks for asking.”

  “Here I am.” Grigor trundled up, heavily chained, and trailed by a cadre of very nervous-looking men with weapons at the ready. He walked up to the stocks of his own volition and remained impassive as his chains were quickly threaded through the iron loops.

  “Well, here we all are again,” Grigor said simply.

  “What next?” Hank asked.

  “We wait for the auction to start, and for someone to buy us,” Orson responded, eyes on Hank. “Although why anyone would bid on you is beyond me.”

  “Hey, whatever happened to high Score good, low Score bad?” Hank asked, rolling his arm over to reveal his Score of 112.

  Orson waved his hand noncommittally. “Here in Meritorium, I’ve heard that they even put a Score on the animal combos. So congratulations, maybe you’re worth more than a chimpanzelle. Probably not a bion, though.”

  Hank swallowed, rolling his arm back to cover the Score.

  Charley thought back to the tracker he had found implanted in the bion outside of Meritropolis. Could it be possible the bion had been scored and tracked in Meritorium but had wandered far away? “So,” Charley said, “is it ‘four legs bad, two legs better’ or ‘four legs good, two legs bad?’”

  Grigor spoke up. “Well, from what I can gather, the amphitheater is designed to mimic the original Roman Colosseum, so spectacle is what they’re after—driven by greed, of course. A mix of High Scores with fighting prowess, rare and violent animal combos, and Low Scores all contribute to bringing in the crowds. Paying crowds.”

  “Meritorium is a very wealthy city. In comparison with Meritropolis, anyway,” Orson said.

  Charley craned his neck to look at Orson. “Try telling that to the people at the bottom. Here we are, sitting in chains, waiting to be bought like a pot or a pan. Some good all of that wealth is doing us.”

  Hank nodded his head. “We are the people at the bottom. High scores or not.”

  “How’s it feel?” Charley kept his gaze on Orson.

  “Eh, I can tell you how it smells.” He wrinkled his nose in Hank’s direction.

  Suddenly, Charley realized something. “You think your father will swoop in and rescue you, don’t you?”

  Orson blanched, his fingers pausing in mid-tap on the iron loop that protruded from their stocks. “He might not even be here,” he said finally.

  “Right …” Charley didn’t know what
to think. He knew he couldn’t trust Orson, but it did seem as if Orson didn’t really have a clue himself. Not for the first time, Charley wondered how much Orson knew and what type of relationship Orson and his father had exactly.

  “So,” Hank said, “what’s the plan here?”

  “One thing’s for certain—” Charley turned from Orson and looked Hank in the eye—“we have to let ourselves be bought without causing any trouble. I don’t want to chance upsetting Marta and getting Sandy hurt while we’re still—” He paused; it felt strange putting it into words. “While we’re still owned by her.”

  “I agree,” Grigor said. “I’ve had a few opportunities for escape already, but we must not endanger Sandy.”

  Charley didn’t doubt it. Even with the double lengths of chain overlapped across Grigor’s broad back, Charley would put money on Grigor’s freakishly big frame going Samson on anyone foolish enough to give him reason to try for an escape.

  “Besides,” Grigor continued calmly, “I think we are more than safe until the Venatio.”

  “Just not comfortable,” Orson added.

  Grigor smiled. “That’s okay. We’ll get a chance to flex our muscles when we are thrown in the amphitheater.” He looked to Charley and Hank. “It might even be fun. Just think of it like a hunt, and one where we know we will see plenty of animal combos.”

  “Yeah, it’s just that there will be dozens of them at once, all hungry, and coming right for us,” Hank grumbled. “Will we even get weapons?”

  “We might have to get creative.” Grigor broke into a smile that showed all of his teeth. Charley wondered how Grigor’s dental exam went. But what he lacked in dental hygiene, he more than made up for in courage and fighting ability, and potential bidders could certainly see that.

  In a way, as long as Sandy was safe, Charley was looking forward to it a little, too. Another spasm of guilt hit as he thought about Sven. Well, Sven and the other Low Scores would have to look out for themselves for now. Just until Charley could get some answers. Charley couldn’t help but think more about Orson: if everyone came from miles around to the Venatio, then Orson’s father had to come too, right?

  Charley hunched his shoulders forward and tried to drape his frame over the wooden stocks for support. Splinters dug into his exposed forearms. He closed his eyes, trying to conserve his strength for later.

  He would be a submissive slave—for now.

  ***

  “He’s fearless, this one here—look at him. He’s fast asleep, not a care in the world.”

  Charley awoke with a start. A large cluster of men and women were grouped around him, peering closely at his face as if he was rare animal in a zoo. He felt something suspiciously like drool sliding down his chin and moved his hand quickly to wipe it away, but in his lingering sleepiness, he forgot the weight of his chained wrists, and overshot his chin, clanking the chain into his cheek in the process. “Ooof.” His face blossomed red, and not just from the impact of his self-inflicted blow. He could hear Orson, Hank, and even Grigor chuckling next to him, but he refused to look at them.

  “He’s only dangerous to himself, this one.” The orange-haired Ian strolled up the group. “None of you actually want to bid on this one, do you? You’ll have to overpay to get him.”

  “Just a friendly reminder that you intend to have him, is it?” A man with a generous potbelly looped his thumbs into his belt loops and gave Ian a look.

  Ian flashed a smile. “Just figured I would help you conserve your money for bidding elsewhere.”

  The man watched Ian closely. “If you’re so intent on having him, maybe I’ll just drive up the price.”

  “If you’re sure he’s who I really want …” Ian eyed Grigor. “Maybe I want to strum up your interest in the boy, so I can snap up this big fella for a bargain. I can’t imagine a match where he isn’t an earner for his owner in the Venatio.”

  Charley could see that by now the potential buyers were watching this exchange closely.

  A lady called out: “Maybe Ian just intends to buy the lot of them. All four of them together could make Ian an instant contender.”

  Ian looked at the woman and winked. “Maybe.” He turned to face the gathering crowd. “But talk is cheap, isn’t it? All of you gawkers and speculators have your theories, but who will take the risk and lay down some coin?” He gestured back to the portly man and gave a friendly poke to his substantial midsection. “You, Harold?”

  The man looked closer at Charley, squinting.

  Charley cocked his head to one side, crossed his eyes, lolled his tongue out like a dog, and let another trickle of drool run down his chin. Maybe the right play was to hope that Ian would buy the four of them. The man harrumphed as the crowd jeered. “Well, it is a substantial risk bidding on these unknown characters.”

  Ian shrugged. “Better stick to buying animal combos and Low Scores. Always safe money in that.”

  “Probably so …” He looked at Charley again suspiciously. Charley aped to the crowd and feigned another display. The man shook his head and walked away, his belly protruding like the helm of a ship, clearing a wide berth through the onlookers.

  “Well,” Ian said, turning to Charley, “we meet again. And I thank you for the theatrics, good sir.” He mimed a tip of a non-existent hat and turned to leave.

  “Wait!” Charley said.

  Ian turned.

  “Is it true what they said? That you want to buy all four of us?”

  Ian smiled. “If I can afford it. The four of you won’t come cheap.”

  Charley searched his face intently. “If you get all four of us, and keep us together, I give you my word that we will make you a lot of money in the Venatio.”

  “You know how the Venatio works?” Ian asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “You tell us what to do, and we’ll do it,” Charley said. “We can, and have, hunted almost everything—and we work best—” Charley swallowed, thinking of Orson—“together, as a team. And you’ve seen what I can do in front of a crowd; we’ll make them love us.”

  Ian scratched the orange stubble on his cheek, his gaze weighing up Charley.

  “Please,” Charley said.

  “Is he telling the truth?” Ian’s unblinking stare settled on Hank.

  “Absolutely,” Hank said quickly, while Grigor nodded in the affirmative and Orson shrugged his agreement.

  Ian smiled like a Cheshire cat. “Well, then. I’ll see what I can do. If you’re half as good as I think you are, we might be able to make a lot of money. But—” the smile never left his face as his eyes flashed—“if you cross me, in any way—one of you tries to escape, tries to throw a match to make some money on the side, anything—I will make each one of you pay.” He enunciated every word very carefully and looked at each of them in turn.

  “We got it,” Charley said.

  “Good.”

  The bidding began minutes later. If being poked and prodded for his examination earlier had made Charley feel like an animal, just a common beast of burden up for sale, he now felt even lower than an animal. A squostrich, a squid-ostrich, the first that Charley had every seen, six snarling rotthogs, of which Charley was very familiar after many hunts, and eight muffalo, mule-buffalo, were all snapped up by the crowd. There were even a few combos that he had never heard of before.

  With nary a break in the program between animals and humans, the auctioneer unceremoniously announced the four of them for sale as a lot, no doubt as a special favor to Ian, a man who, by all appearances, was a man of some importance in Meritorium. The auctioneer barked a string of numbers in a machine-gun staccato that Charley could hardly follow. Seeing the faces in the crowd staring, pointing, desire and naked greed on their faces, Charley lowered his head. The four of them were no different than a lot of six rotthogs or eight muffalo—the only distinction was the price someone was willing to pay, and
the financial return expected of them in the Venatio.

  Charley raised his head. They were being treated just like animals, but who were the real animals in this scene? He looked from the snarling rotthogs to the predatory bidding arms waving high in the crowd, eyes bugged out with a craving to possess other human beings. Charley’s eyes scanned from rotthog pen to bidding area and felt, if he looked from one to the other and back again, that they began to blend together. The two were virtually indistinguishable.

  “Sold!” the auctioneer cried out. “The lot of four goes to this gentlemen for fifty-three thousand.”

  Charley turned his head to meet Ian’s wolfish smile. The crowd looked on hungrily, some congratulating Ian on his purchase, others licking their lips, anticipating their next opportunity to make a profit.

  Charley’s eyes widened as two young girls, each no older than thirteen, were shoved to the forefront, the next lot for bidding, their handlers not even finding it necessary to restrain their frail little arms. The girls whimpered, holding each other for comfort.

  The large, pot-bellied man stepped up closer and raised a meaty, sweating hand to place a bid.

  The familiar rage scratched up the back of Charley’s neck. Waves of fury danced across his vision as Charley watched Harold lick his blubbery lips in anticipation.

  “Wait, not now,” Grigor intoned under his breath to Charley, his deep voice staticky with a menace of his own. “We will get our chance soon. Just wait.”

  Charley swallowed his anger, sucking it deep inside, to where it boiled and bubbled in a viscous fizz of magmatic energy. He watched Harold win the bid and approach the girls with a carnivorous look in his eyes. Sickened, Charley forced himself to watch.

  Charley decided he would indeed put on a show in the Venatio. He would hunt the animals down.

  CHAPTER 7

  Vanity’s Fare

  Charley’s first step into Meritorium proper forced him to see Meritropolis for what it really was: a small fortress on the outskirts of civilization, a podunk village of insignificance, a pinprick on the map of the post-Event world. He craned his head in wonder, not thinking about the chains tugging on his neck. The towering structures rose upward into the blue-grey sky like sentinels, severe and foreboding, blotting out the sun, as Charley, Hank, Grigor, and Orson followed between Ian and his troop of well-armed personal guards.