by R. K. Gold
"Don't worry, I learned my lesson with you," he said as she pulled the trigger. Before she could ditch the rifle and run, Jakobe tagged her in the cheek. She dropped to the ground, holding her face. Jakobe went to rip the bag away, but it caught on her belt.
The lights were gaining on him. He had no time and close to no ammo to fight back. He kicked her in the back and pulled the bag until it tore free. He rushed back to his bike and rode off.
8
He lost a lot of time, but even worse, he lost the purifier. Jakobe rummaged through his bag trying to find it. The map was there, as were his food rations and the water he already cleansed. He snagged the conductor Myskin made for him and tucked it in his jacket pocket, right over his chest. It felt safe there; after all, the last time someone wore the device, it stopped a bullet. Jakobe finished checking his possessions when he was safely around the fissure. He sealed the hole in the bag then turned back toward the storm divide. He didn't have any other choice.
"I could turn back to Lyo and let them kill me, or I could head back to the city and get killed by that stampede looking for bloodshed," he said and looked over his final rations of water. It was easier to justify continuing when he heard his lack of options out loud. He only had two days’ worth of water left. He could maybe stretch it to three if he was strict with it. "I hate thieves," he added without a hint of irony. He most likely meant himself.
***
Most of Jakobe's childhood was spent on his back. Children were the most precious commodity to his village and needed to be protected at all costs. His village was in the southeast, not far from the dumping grounds. Most of the sleeping quarters were in the center of the camp. Everyone slept in tents that circled around the primary well and cooking cabin. The layer beyond the sleeping quarters were cabins for storage.
To outsiders, they lived in a wasteland, but those who were raised there knew how to survive. The children were raised in what the village called the nest. It was the largest tent in camp. They rarely had enough food for everybody. Those in their prime ate first, followed by the children, and the eldest last. Those in their prime maintained their survival, riding north to bring back supplies and food. This ranged from food to guns and ammunition. The children were given a priority for food because one day the village's livelihood would rely on them. The eldest were given scraps to fight amongst themselves for.
The one benefit the village had was a below-ground water source. It was why their village was on the last remaining grassland in the southeast. Most days were spent digging more wells. Being in the southeast was their main source of protection. Though they did not have much in the way of natural protection, living in one of the rare green patches of the southeast, the reputation of the wastelands near the dumping grounds kept most raiders away.
Jakobe spent most of his days pretending he was dead. There wasn't much for them to do in the nest. Bundled in a hammock and hung from the ceiling, they weren't allowed to leave their sleeping quarters except to use the bathroom. Everything they ate and drank was carefully measured, until they finally came of age. The age differed per child but was generally seen as the time their body physically outgrew the hammock.
Once out, they were forced to dig new wells at night and train combat by day. Water and fighting were how they survived. Most of their training was with firearms. It gave them a distinct advantage over most raiding parties in the east that preferred fighting in close quarters. Guns were far from reliable, jamming at the worst possible times and rarely kept in decent condition.
The children had to learn fast. The second they consumed more than they recovered, they were eliminated. There was no family there, just optimal measurements. Input must equal output or be removed. The mother and father were the land. Birth mothers were stripped of their children seconds after the child was born, never knowing which was theirs for sure. As for the fathers, it was usually just as vague. Men and women had numerous intimate partners. Emotions that put individuals above the survival of the village itself were a danger to everyone. It made disposing of those who didn't survive easier.
They said it was to preserve energy and use fewer resources, but Jakobe never understood what the point of being alive was if you were just gonna act dead the whole time. It was why Lyo's plan bothered him so much. Running into a dumping site to die wasn't a way to live; it gave them a small promise of a tomorrow, but at what cost?
Jakobe's first run in with the white lines was during a raid. They could only keep the secret of their water for so long. The grass couldn't lie. They fought off the white lines but lost a quarter of their village. Jakobe was handed a knife and told to cut down the rest of the children in the nest. None of them had ever held a gun.
The second raid was not as successful; it was when Jakobe first saw Clive in action. Not only with his White Liners but forces from his father's Red Eye army. "East and West doesn't matter. Soon the whole world will be nothing but white and red," he used to say. "And us, we'll be on thrones, never having to stress about food or water again."
It scared him how men like Lyo and Clive could be so alike and at the same time completely different. It showed just how close his friends and enemies could be. Both put survival above all else, but for Clive, it meant taking as much as he could, and for Lyo, it meant taking only what they needed because you could only rob a corpse once.
The side of Clive Jakobe saw was that he had no issue sending other men into a fight they couldn't win if it weakened the target. He then took his own forces in for the kill. The first wave did its job.
The village was difficult to read; everyone was trained to defend it. No one was strictly on guard duty because hardly anyone rode that far southeast, but everyone awake could protect the village at a moment's notice. Once you were cut free from the nest, your top priority was ensuring its survival. Jakobe was cut down a month before the first raid and started training in defense. For thirty days all he did was bring water to the communal purifier and train with his rifle.
One thing his month of training didn't teach him was bravery. The camp said they lived and died as one, but Jakobe had only been out of the nest for a month. He had less than a month of actual living. The men and women cut down by raiders on motorcycles weren't his family. While they ran to fight off Clive's army, Jakobe ran to the outskirts of the village and took cover. He didn't see two sides; he saw corpses and potential corpses. The first raid he hid behind their silo on the outermost border of the village. It had a refrigerator inside and was used for storage, so Jakobe thought he'd store his life in there until the fight was over.
Though more than half the camp was downed in the fight, the White Liners were wiped out. Jakobe didn't see a single one run away. While the rest of his village cleared the bodies and dug a mass grave, Jakobe wondered what the raiders were so afraid of to stay and fight to the death instead of running with whatever life they had left.
An hour later he found out. A lanky teen, only a few years older than him, rode in on a four-wheeler screeching at the top of his lungs. His long blond hair blew in the wind, at times covering his face, adding to the wildness of his ride. A much larger force than the first white liner raid followed in his wake. There wasn't much fight left in the village. Not only did the first wave exhaust them, but it gave them the false sense of security that the fighting was all over.
Jakobe ran to the nest and cut all the children from their hammocks. He didn't do it to save them, though the thought crossed his mind. He released them for cover. The more bodies distracting the raiders the better. When most of the fighting finished, Clive dismounted his ride and walked through the village, cutting down anyone he could find.
Jakobe ran back to the silo, prepared to run deep into the wastelands if he had to. He readied his rifle and watched the raiders sweep through the village. He prayed no one spotted him. Using his weapon would draw too much attention to himself since only Clive was still using firearms, the rest of his men preferring various types of blades and blun
t instruments on helpless opponents.
Jakobe made it through from the Silo to the road undetected. The closer he was to the bikes, the fewer raiders there were. Like the village was after the first raid, Clive's men were lulled into a sense of security. They didn't take into account a villager avoiding the fight. If everyone fought to the death, why should Jakobe differ? Jakobe didn't care who won or lost as long as he wasn't killed. To him, Clive's men were just a way out of the fight.
Jakobe boosted the four wheeler and rode up the mountain. He had a decent head start, but Clive's ride didn't have the speed of the bikes. They caught up to him and cut him off. Jakobe drove into a ditch and fell over the hood. He rolled over the ground and was surrounded by a dozen men the moment he got to his knees. He lost count of how many men kicked him in the stomach, chest, and face. He pulled his knees to his torso and covered his head with his arms until the hitting stopped.
"So you're the kid who stole my ride," a surprisingly high-pitched voice said. Jakobe looked up and saw Clive standing just in front of him. He carried himself with such a large presence that Jakobe was shocked to see how short he was. When he brushed his long hair off his face and tucked it behind his ear, he looked like he’d barely reached puberty. His pale forehead was covered in acne, and he was missing a front tooth. The rest were stained yellow.
"I saw a way to survive," Jakobe replied and looked back at the ground. The longer he stared, the more likely he was to say or do something stupid, so he focused on a small hole six inches in front of his knees. He saw the circle close in on him. Each man took a step. They seemed eager, like the first one to reach Jakobe got to kill him.
Clive laughed. "I like that. ‘A way to survive.’ See—that's something I can get behind. That's something we all can relate to. ‘Way to survive.’ I bet you're good at it, aren't you?"
"I'm not too sure; at the moment I don't feel like I am," Jakobe said, looking to his left. One man in particular was closer than all the rest. He wore his hair similarly to Clive but looked ten years older. A grown man taking orders from a kid? Just who was Clive?
Jakobe instinctively put his hand out for his rifle, but someone kicked him in the face before he could make a move. A second and a third kick landed on his chest. Jakobe thrashed at anything he could but only hit air. The kicking continued until he heard Clive say, "Alright, enough, enough, we need him alive."
"Alive?" Jakobe asked, spitting blood at his feet when he spoke. His insides felt on fire. Each breath was agony, and his ribs struggled to hold up air.
"We got a job for you. Survive and I think we can find a permanent place for you," Clive said.
9
Jakobe only took half of his day's rations and rode through the night to the storm divide. He wasn't far. Seeing the White Liners brought back a lot of old memories. He needed a new start. He needed to leave the east behind.
If Lyo were there, he'd tell him to shut his mind off and focus on the present. The past could only get him killed. Jakobe always thought that meant he had to focus, but after hearing about Robe, he wondered if it had a more literal meaning.
From a distance the storm divide looked like a smoky border. The lightning fired in all directions, circling unnaturally in the sky like a lasso before striking the ground. The border constantly shifted back and forth, kicking up dirt and swirling it around.
He stopped where the dust settled. A clear border spread across the ground. Just beyond the line, the earth on the sides of the road hovered in the air and whirled around. Jakobe hopped off his bike and reached his hand across the line. He felt a tug from the storm. A pull that reached through his body, down his sternum and to the pit of his stomach. A string and a gentle pull, but with each step he took, the pull grew.
"Pretty terrifying, isn't it?" a familiar voice asked. Jakobe yanked his hand back and turned around. Myskin stood next to Jakobe's bike and fiddled his thumbs around one another. “Took off with the purifier? That was pretty rude of you."
"How'd you know where I'd be?"
He tapped his temple. "Saw it. Wasn't too difficult to believe since you've been talking about heading west for some time. Not to mention, even you aren't dumb enough to enter the storm on a back road. Figured you'd hit the main highway and head west."
"You came alone? If Lyo wanted to stop me, I would've thought he'd use more force."
"Lyo wants to cut your head, but I convinced him to let me talk to you first." He pulled his machete from his back sheath and rested the side of the blade on his shoulder.
"Why do you care?" Jakobe stood opposite of Myskin. "You gonna let go of that?"
Myskin stepped away from the bike and kicked dirt at its carriage. "There's no point in killing you if you're gonna go into the divide. The storm will do that all on its own. I just want the purifier back."
"I don't have it anymore." Jakobe inched his hand toward his revolver. His chest tightened when he locked eyes with Myskin. They had saved each other’s lives more times than any of them could count. Even with his blade out, Jakobe still saw the kid only a few years older than him who gave him a canteen full of water and a warm fire when he had nowhere else to go. The man who fixed up his bike and gutted a white liner who snuck up on Jakobe when he was too focused on providing cover for Forte.
"You know, it's tough for me to believe anything that comes out of your mouth." Myskin pointed the tip of his blade at Jakobe.
"My bag was torn to shreds by some white liner in the city. I almost lost everything."
"See you still have your guns." He nodded at the grip Jakobe reached for.
"Those don't leave my side," Jakobe replied and took his eyes off Myskin for less than a second. He saw movement in the distance. Three men were riding toward them at full speed.
Next thing he knew, he was flat on his back with a bludgeoned pain in his chest. Myskin's fist glistened. His knuckles were metal. "You upgraded," Jakobe replied and drew his revolver. He shot from the hip and clipped Myskin's shoulder. The blow was enough to send him back, but Myskin looked more annoyed than anything. He yanked the hole in his sleeve where the bullet pierced, and Jakobe saw the armor extended up his arms and across his chest. Myskin looked at the damage, then back at Jakobe.
"You coulda killed me," he said, but it sounded more like the question why didn't you kill me? He sheathed his machete.
Jakobe climbed to his feet. Lyo, Bronx, and Forte were almost there, and Myskin remained still. "I know when I'm beaten. I lost the purifier, otherwise I would've given it to you."
The words had no effect on Myskin, who still examined the glancing blow. "Why didn't you kill me?"
"I would never kill you, any of you. We all have a line somewhere; I thought what made us a family was our lines stopped at each other." Jakobe hopped on his bike. Myskin didn't stand in his way. "You can come with."
"Lyo intends to. You stole from him and something snapped. Trust me when I tell you that he will never stop hunting you, and by extension, we won't either. You let me live, and I can't in good conscience stop you now, just know if our paths ever do cross again, I will not be able to stop the others."
Jakobe didn't need to get in the last word. He nodded, started his bike and entered the storm.
10
When he crossed the border, it felt more like entering a bubble. Sound disappeared, and everything looked disfigured. The ground looked unleveled, and the dirt in the air gave everything a curve to it, like the ground was the shoulder of a giant. Jakobe almost fell over a hole in the ground he thought was ten feet away. He pulled his goggles down. Something glistened in the distance. It burned him as it passed his shoulder only a second later. Things in the storm were closer than they appeared.
On the other side of the storm's border, the vivid break from light to dark blended together. Though he still had some distance before he entered the actual storm, the lightning felt right on top of him. He looked to the sky and saw it flash inside the dark clouds. The thunder was so loud, it felt like it came from
the ground and shook his bike. His body trembled.
A loud crack that came from a distance was followed by three more. Jakobe flinched with each one. He couldn't see where they came from. Again, the three cracks sounded in succession. He looked back and saw Lyo on his tail. The others followed behind. They looked like they were riding along a sphere, with Lyo on top and the others descending down the side.
The road disappeared as the wind picked up. Black, white, brown, and gray particles swirled together, dusting the road and only parting when Jakobe passed. The dirt rose off the ground and splashed in front of him, moving back and forth like a current. He cut through it, but the further he moved into the storm, the more resistance the earth gave.
Another crack. Gunfire was the only thing loud enough to break the overwhelming sound. Even as Lyo moved closer, his shots couldn't touch Jakobe. The storm took them away. Jakobe's muscles relaxed in relief only to cramp a moment later in fear. His only chance to defend himself were his guns; now it was his wheels.
He couldn't see. His goggles clouded by the dirt, but he accelerated nonetheless. No point in hesitating or slowing down. If any obstacles were in front of him, he wouldn't be able to tell no matter what speed he went.
A heavy gust nearly knocked him off his bike. The storm blasted him in all directions at once, whirling around him. The skin on his face felt like it was about to peel off. Even under goggles, his eyes teared up until they dried. Each breath was more difficult to take than the last. A pressure built over his chest, restraining it from expanding. The air moved so fast, it felt silent and formed a sheet over his mouth. He entered the darkness of where the true storm began, and the cold hit him before anything else.
