Covenant

by Jim Miesner

  The woman snarled at her and Jenny grabbed Sam by the wrist. “It’s okay,” she said.

  Another man grabbed Jenny by the arm and smiled as he looked down at her body before John’s hand grabbed him by the neck and lifted him a few inches off the ground. The man’s face went red as his eyes bulged out of his head.

  “Back to work,” John said. “No one touches them. Understand?”

  The man kicked his feet in the air as he tried to nod and John dropped him to the ground. He rubbed his hands over his neck before another man grabbed him by the shirt and began to drag him back toward the ship. The others began to hurry back toward the ship along with him, leaving Jenny and Sam alone.

  “Wait,” Sam said. “You can’t leave us out here.”

  John glanced back at them and kept on moving.

  “Which way are you going?” she asked. “It’s north, isn’t it. Toward the caves? Take us with you. We need a ride north. If you take us, I can help you. I can show you what all of that medicine is for. I can treat your sick. If you take us with you.”

  John swung around and Sam almost ran into his giant chest, not expecting him to turn. She looked up into his cold eyes.

  “You’re a doctor?” he asked.

  “She’s a counselor,” Jenny blurted out.

  The man looked between Jenny and Sam before the corners of his eyes wrinkled and a slow heavy chuckle began to emanate from his chest. His teeth were yellowed, some were black, and many were missing.

  “Really," Sam said. "I know what the medicine does. I can help you.”

  “She’s telling the truth,” Jenny said.

  He continued to laugh and Sam could feel a hotness start in her chest and warm her cheeks. They didn’t have time for this.

  “You need us,” she yelled.

  The smile disappeared from his face.

  “We don’t need anyone. You’re the ones that need someone. You better start walking back if you want to survive. It gets pretty hot out here.”

  “Why are you being so stubborn?”

  John stuck his finger in her face.

  “You don’t know this world. You have no idea. If you want to live you need to go back. I can’t protect you where we’re going.”

  Jenny began to suck in little breaths that grew into a gentle sob. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I just wanted to see my mom.”

  John turned back around and kept on walking.

  “I’ll never see her again. The Coven will find us and kill us both.”

  Sam watched as John glanced back at them, but didn't slow. Jenny began to wail louder. Real tears ran from her eyes as she threw her face into her hands, letting her hair dangle down over them. Sam brought her closer to her chest as she sobbed into her shoulder.

  “It’s okay. We’ll be okay,” she found herself saying.

  John twirled around and pointed a finger at them. “I know what you’re doing,” he said.

  Jenny wailed louder as Sam held her tighter.

  “That’s enough!” he shouted.

  “Please, she doesn’t deserve this. Take us with you, at least to the caves. She has family in that direction.”

  John stopped and watched his crew as they did their work. “We all have family somewhere.” He sighed. “We’ll take the girl but not you.”

  Jenny wiped the tears from her face and winked at Sam behind her hand. “We’re a team,” she said. “I need her to find my mom.”

  “She won’t survive.”

  “I won’t survive if they find me either,” Sam said. “You saw what they did to our ship.”

  “If they catch you with us…”

  “They won’t. We just need a ride. Then we’re gone.”

  He eyed Sam and then looked back to the ship and at Sam again before he grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her forward.

  “Hey,” she said as she struggled to keep up to his long strides. “What are you-”

  “Not another word,” he said and pushed her into the back of an open trailer attached to a dune buggy.

  Sam fell forward and almost sliced her hands on the uneven edge. She turned to see him hurrying Jenny along by the arm before he pointed her to another cart.

  Next to the ship a man hacked and spat on the ground as everyone laughed. He had gotten the lid off an emergency canister of the Source and continued to gag as another stuck his finger in it, put it in his mouth and twisted his face up before he bent over and spat on the ground. More laughter followed as each took turns.

  “Tastes like a dog pissed on a cat turd,” one of them said.

  The man with the eye patch grabbed the canister and tossed it into the night.

  “Stop wasting your time with that garbage and get back to work.”

  He picked up a piece of metal and lugged it over to the cart when he caught Sam sitting in the back.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “We’re going with you north as far as we can. I’m taking Jenny to her mother. She’s in Colorado.”

  He shook his head and dropped it into the back, almost nicking Sam. “You’re a fool. I would have taken my chances with the Coven if I was you.”

  “They would have killed us both.”

  “At least it would have been a quick death. You won’t make it anywhere near Colorado before you’re dead. Do you know what happens to young girls out here without families?”

  He shook his head and tossed another piece into the cart. Sam looked away from him and at John as he carried metal to his own cart and laid it down, careful not to hit Jenny.

  “We’ll figure it out,” she said. "Who’s Emmanuel? He protects you. Can he help us?”

  He laughed. “Emmanuel? You don’t want to meet Emmanuel. Trust me.”

  “Why not?”

  He paused and got closer to her. “People around him have a way of ending up dead. If you and the girl want to stay alive, you’ll steer clear.” Then he walked back to the ship without saying another word.

  It wasn’t long before they had stripped most of the craft, and the first of the buggies made their way into the night. That was when Sam noticed the human skulls mounted between the headlights. The disturbing hood ornaments were painted in what looked like blood. It had been almost impossible to miss yet somehow, she had.

  The woman with the black makeup climbed into the buggy next to the man with the eye patch, and did a double take when she saw Sam. The man said something to her, and she shook her head before turning around without another glance.

  The world out here was everything she had been told. It was a world of brutal savages eking out an existence, seemingly ready to kill at a moment’s notice. It was all true. Yet there was something more. They could have left her and Jenny out here, killed them both or worse. Maybe they still would, yet here they were showing them some semblance of generosity.

  She watched as the giant handed Jenny a canteen. The girl guzzled it down like she hadn’t drank in days and then the cart jerked forward. Sam grabbed onto the side and pressed her palms into its sharp edge, trying to hold on. It was hard to see where they were going except for the headlights of the other buggies ahead of them.

  In the darkness, Sam remembered the pain and sucked air through her teeth as she pulled out the three-inch cactus needle from her thigh. If anyone heard her scream, no one pretended to care.

  The wound wasn’t deep, but she knew what it meant. Every cut, every injury was an accelerated timeline. She would be lucky to make it the next forty-eight hours. How far could she get Jenny in that time? The last thing she remembered before she fell asleep was the city skyline behind them as it grew smaller and smaller on the horizon.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  They were still traveling when Sam awoke. The orange sun peeked over the edges of the hills and highlighted the large blood stain that covered her thigh. A dull throbbing echoed in her head and there was a soreness in her throat as she wiped the sticky crust from her eyes.

  She looked back again to see only open d
esert behind her, the Covenant no longer on the horizon. In front of them was a cluster of hills. Sam didn’t see the tents until they were almost on top of them. They were the same color as the surrounding stone. Odd smells began to fill her nostrils as they drew closer and she retched as the bile rose up in her throat. Thinking quickly, she tore off a piece of her pants where the cactus needle had slashed her the night before and crammed the piece of fabric into her nostrils. After a few minutes the queasiness abated, but the headache remained.

  The camouflaged tents were all the same and looked like they had been scavenged from some old army depot. It felt like all eyes were on Sam though as they drove through the shanty village. Soured, withered faces looked up at her while dirty children pointed. Sweaty men and women covered in dirt and dressed in rags haggled with each other over rotten vegetables and tiny animal carcasses. Each tent held something different and carried everything from homemade knives to dead rattlesnakes that dangled on hooks. This was no doubt the armpit of the world. They would have called this third world once, maybe even fourth world. Before she knew it, the engine cut out, and they stopped.

  The man with the eye patch and the black-eyed woman hopped off without looking back. Sam jumped to the ground to follow them but was knocked off balance by a man as he passed by carrying a large sack. Getting back up a shirtless man knocked into her other shoulder. Before she knew it, she'd lost sight of everyone she'd come here with. Her head swiveled around as the bedraggled crowd flowed past her.

  “Watch it,” an old scraggly woman said as she passed by pulling a hairless goat behind her.

  Sam stood on tiptoe trying to see over the crowd for some sign of those she'd come here with. She was ready to get back into the cart to get a better view, when she swore she caught a glimpse of a child in white.

  “Jenny!” she yelled over the shouting mob of voices that surrounded her. “Jenny!”

  She fought against the crowd, trying her best not to touch anyone or anything but failing miserably. People jostled her as she held her ground this time and moved forward. She couldn’t see any sign of Jenny, instead dirty toothless faces glared back at her. One woman’s face was so wrinkled it looked like a raisin. Men and women she didn’t recognize began to grab the metal and plastic from the bed of the trailer, and move through the crowd. Sam followed after them, hoping they might be some clue where Jenny had gone as she pushed her way through the dirty mob forcefully now. She could almost taste the body odor and fought away a gag. Following them into a tent, she immediately covered her mouth.

  There were more goats and sheep inside than people. They bleated as flies buzzed everywhere. They landed on the animals as well as their droppings. She tried to shake them off and duck away from them as they buzzed around her head, almost causing her to step in a fresh pile of dung. Without warning, something dog-like ran up to her and Sam shrank back as it sniffed the hem of her pants. It looked up at her a moment before it ran toward a pen where men cut sheep's wool with large medieval-looking scissors. Others held newborn goats and lambs in their arms in a line as a small man not much taller than Jenny, pried open their lips and looked in their mouths, ears, and eyes.

  Then she heard the man with the eye patch’s voice pierce through the low grumble of the crowd. “These are right from a Covenant ship.”

  “An old one,” a man yelled back. “I can give you a tenth of what you’re asking.”

  “Are you nuts?”

  She thought she saw the flick of white and a girl’s auburn hair, this time on the other side of the tent. Sam danced around men and women, careful not to touch anyone as she drew near to the far side of the tent. The sounds of the music, animals bleating and people shouting grew louder, and she felt the throbbing in her head grow as she closed in. Then a young man stood in front of her. She stepped to the side, but he moved in front of her, then to the other side and he stepped in front of her again.

  “Excuse me,” she said before he grabbed her wrist.

  “Why are you here?” he asked.

  He didn’t look any different from the rest. It could have been a decade since he last bathed, maybe his entire life. He dressed in ragged jean shorts, a tank top that looked like it had once been a tarp, sandals that had once been tires and sported a large beard.

  Sam jerked her hand from his grasp. “That’s not your business.”

  He reached down, lifted Sam’s shirt six inches and let it drop again. She was tired of people doing that.

  “John!” he yelled across the tent.

  The crowd parted like the red sea as the giant made his way through them.

  “Why is she here?” the annoyed man asked.

  “I’m sorry, Emmanuel. We found them in the desert,” John said. “Her and a normal girl.”

  “This is Emmanuel?” Sam asked. He was much younger than she had expected. He couldn’t have been more than a few years older than her.

  “I didn’t ask where you found her,” he said and sneered. “I asked why is she here.”

  “She’s returning a girl to her family. We gave them a ride. They aren’t staying.”

  “And you believed her?”

  “Their ship was shot down. The girl vouched for her.”

  “What were you doing near a Covenant ship?”

  John looked down sheepishly. “We scavenged some of it.”

  Emmanuel pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers as he furrowed his brow and squeezed his eyes shut. “Are you kidding me?”

  “We didn’t take anything they could track. I made sure of it.”

  Emmanuel looked around the tent and marched toward a stand where the man with the eye patch stood with the plastic and metal from the ship. Immediately he began to grab pieces and throw them to the ground. The man with the eye patch jumped back startled.

  “Hey, that’s mine,” said the man behind the stand who had thought it worthless moments earlier.

  Emmanuel grabbed him by the collar and pulled him across the counter as his eyes bulged. He looked from him to the man with the eye patch before he let go and dropped him.

  “Kelly, all of this goes back,” he said to the man with the eye patch. “Every single piece.”

  He marched back past John. “Help Kelly get rid of that,” he said then pointed at Sam, “and her too.”

  John looked at Sam, to the junk and then back at Emmanuel. "Both?" John asked. "Back out there in the desert? The girl too?"

  Emmanuel stopped without turning around. “The girl too,” he said and continued on.

  Sam followed him as he pushed through a canvas flap. This side of the camp was filled with the same hodgepodge of homemade tents and wooden stands. Men and women sniffed shriveled carrots and lumps of purple, fly-covered flesh on scales.

  "We’re not going anywhere."

  Emmanuel bent over, grabbed a sheep and clipped away at it with the enormous medieval looking iron scissors.

  “Did you hear me?” she said louder. “I am staying with Jenny and we’re heading north to her family.

  He drew a breath, without looking at her. “Your being here endangers us all. The Covenant stays out of our hair, we stay out of theirs. That’s the deal we have. I’m not going to jeopardize that aiding two fugitive girls. You and everything else goes back to where you came from.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  She looked up at John for some sign in his eyes that he might back her up, but as soon as she met his gaze, he looked away.

  “Where’s Jenny?” she asked. “We’re leaving.”

  She took a step and within a second Emmanuel’s meaty hand took hold of her wrist.

  “Let me go,” she said.

  She tried to break free of his grip but this time he held on tight.

  “You can’t do this,” Sam said. “You have no right.”

  One side of his lip curled up in disgust, the other into a smile as he put the shears down on an overturned plastic bucket.

  “Maybe you give the orders inside the Shell but
this is our territory. Out here, we make the decisions on what's best.”

  Maybe it was the headache, the leg wound or the encroaching nausea that hovered on the periphery. Maybe it was that she didn’t know where Jenny was and she didn’t know who she was with. Or that she knew it wouldn’t be long before she ran out of time, her body rotted away and she would be useless to anyone. Whatever the final straw was, something inside her snapped. She snatched the scissors and thrust them at Emmanuel’s neck. He didn’t move a millimeter as one by one the crowd fell silent.

  “I don’t know who you think you are,” she said. “But that girl doesn’t belong to you. I want to see her right now.”

  He didn’t so much as blink as she pressed the point against his neck.

  “I swear,” Sam said. “If anything happens to Jenny…”

  “You’ll swear to what?” Emmanuel said. “There isn’t anything you can take from us that hasn’t already been taken.”

  Sam held it against his throat and Emmanuel pressed harder into it as a drop of blood began to run down his neck.

  “Go ahead. Do it.”

  She took in short shallow breaths. All eyes stared at them, her eyes flicked between Emmanuel and the crowd and then a large hand grabbed her by the wrist and pried the scissors away. When she turned, she saw it was John. He handed the scissors to Emmanuel, who took them and pointed them at her as he flared his nostrils. She waited for some kind of retaliation or lesson but he just let out a heavy breath, turned around and clipped the sheep.

  “Put her with the girl,” he said. “Make sure there is food and water.”

  “We’ll bring some with us and leave right away,” John said.

  “No. Wait for me to finish up here. I’m going with you. I want to make sure nothing happens.” He looked up. “She’s much more resourceful than she looks. We can’t take any chances.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The yell of voices from the market vibrated her skull as she rubbed her throbbing temples; it was getting worse. It felt like someone was poking her brain with a hundred little sticks. She pushed the fabric further up her nose, hoping that might help somehow.