by Teresa Grabs
“The only way to survive is to keep moving forward.”
Charlie cocked his head as if trying to understand why they would want to leave such a nice place, especially since he just killed the enemy, but he was willing nonetheless. Echo picked up her empty backpack and looked at its former contents on the ground. Everything held new meaning. It was no longer about sentiment or connection to her life in Bakerton; now it was about survival. The cup was essential as it allowed her to carry water and went in first. Did she need a plate and fork? What about Michael’s bracelet and Matthew’s? She looked at those and reappraised their value. She owed nothing to Michael. There must have been a reason he was sent to the re-education center. No, he was like the people the outpost agents executed. She owed it to Matthew to survive. To remember him. Set put his bracelet and notepad in next.
The hammer was vital, and as she picked it up, she looked back at the creature. Those teeth are as sharp as knives and could make a proper weapon. Without too much further thought, she walked over the dead creature and hit its jaws with the hammer until a handful of teeth broke away from the bone. Leaning over its head and seeing what she was doing was made more difficult by her matted hair that fell over her eyes in clumps. She knew exactly what she wanted to test the usefulness of its teeth on. She stripped last night’s torch of its cloth and picked up a large tooth, leaned over, and proceeded to cut her hair. It was a slow process, but one that, when she was finished, was extremely liberating. She had never had short hair, but it seemed appropriate for her new life. Using the hammer to extract more teeth was much easier now that she could see. She wrapped all the teeth in the torch cloth and tossed that in her backpack. She looked at the journal and pencil. Before yesterday, it seemed so important, but now she wasn’t sure. The paper might come in useful later, though, so she tossed it in the backpack.
Nothing else in the cave seemed to hold any importance in Echo’s new life. She tied three spears to her backpack with small strips of bark and slung it over her shoulders and carried the last spear. With a deep, determined breath and one last look at her old home, Echo and Charlie headed West. She hoped they would reach whatever that was that had reflected the light, or at least another oasis or cave, before nightfall. Charlie was more than happy to follow his friend wherever she would lead him. Whatever happened from then on, Echo was now fully in charge of her future.
◆◆◆
Echo and Charlie had not walked long before they came to another oasis similar to the other two they had found. Water and shade from the early afternoon sun was a welcomed respite from trudging through loose sand that swallowed her feet with every step. Charlie jumped into the spring again while Echo took the opportunity to fill her backpack with carrots.
“We can’t stay, Charlie. I wish we could, but it’s not safe here,” she said, running her hand along the dried imprint of an anghenbeast’s paw in the mud.
She joined Charlie for one last dip in the spring and long drink before they headed back out into the hot plains. The next few hours of hill after sandy hill taxed her strength, but Charlie’s barking and ever happy expression encouraged her onward.
“Hold up, Charlie,” she said, dropping the spear and slinging the backpack off her shoulders so that she could get some food. “Hey, look at the ground.”
The backpack didn’t sink into the tan sand that painted the landscape. She shielded her eyes to look around better and saw tufts of grass in pockets dotting the path in front of her. Another oasis must be nearby, but she didn’t see any trees. Water, somewhere to sit, and more strawberries or carrots were all the encouragement she needed to trudge onward. After finishing a carrot, she flung the backpack back on and picked up her spear. Charlie ran ahead and disappeared over the hill.
“Hey! Wait up!”
Echo jogged up the hill to catch up but stopped at the top. She rubbed her eyes in disbelief. Charlie ran up wagging his tail and panting.
“Do you see what I see, Charlie?”
Thirteen
Echo gasped as her eyes took in the ruins of a city stretching below her. The late afternoon light reflected off the metal skeletal framework of a building. The city looked as if it might have once been as large as Bakerton, but now reclaimed by plants, time, and, the anghenbeast…or worse. Her pounding heart echoed in her ears between heaving breaths somewhere between excitement and fear. Her knuckles turned white waiting for her brain to decide if it was more afraid than excited, or more excited than afraid. After a few minutes of looking, listening, and thinking, excitement conquered fear and Echo began to smile.
“Hello!” she yelled, half expecting a faint echo, but the only response was a flock of birds suddenly taking flight.
She laughed and looked for a safe way down. Charlie took care of that for her as he too had become excited about the new adventure that lay ahead of them and ran down the hill barking. She watched as he zigged this way and zagged that way all the down. He ran around in circles, barking, encouraging Echo to hurry. Charlie became more and more impatient and anxious the longer he was separated from Echo, so he started running back up to her then down to the bottom. When Echo finally joined him at the bottom, Charlie erupted into a barking frenzy that made her laugh harder than she had since being exiled. She could always count on Charlie to lighten her mood.
“Whoa!” Echo yelled as small, rapid movement under the ground covering startled her.
Suddenly highly aware of every sound and slightest movement surrounding them, she clutched her spear, ready for anything that may come and pointed it at the ground. A small, sandy-colored furry animal scurried through the ground covering toward nearby bushes trying to flee the newcomers. Echo chuckled nervously and slowly relaxed. Her breathing slowed and returned to normal. Well, as normal as it had become. She was accustomed to her pounding heart and rapid breathing that had been her second companion. Being completely relaxed seemed foreign and nothing more than a distant memory.
“Don’t be fooled, Charlie. There could be thousands of anghenbeasts in here. Watching us. Waiting. Just like the other ones did.”
Charlie sniffed the air and cocked his head at her, then trotted off down a former street. Echo stood still, confused, then shrugged as she slowly followed Charlie. The city was in ruins with many buildings being nothing more than their metal skeletons. Some stone buildings remained, highly weathered by the sun and wind, but still identifiable as a commercial or residential building. As they walked, more animals scurried into hiding, startled by the sudden appearance of the newcomers.
“Hello!” Echo yelled, straining to hear to a response.
The deeper they went into the city, the thicker the vegetation became and the larger the animals became. None seemed threatening, but just interested in the plants that were growing up the buildings and across the ground. Echo felt safe among the buildings. It was almost inviting. Buildings grew closer together and taller the further they went.
“Hey, Charlie? Doesn’t that look like the medical center back home?” she asked, pointing to a large, weathered stone building.
Charlie responded with his usual bark and resumed chasing the small animals scurrying under the plants. What once was a road, was now nothing more than a maze of vines and plants sprouting up between slabs of concrete causing them to crack and perch precariously on edges worn down by time. After nearly getting crushed by a large slab, Echo decided it was better to use her spear and prod her way through the maze to what she hoped was a former medical center. It took her quite some time, but she finally made it to what would have been the front door. Charlie was waiting for her, wagging his tail, and finishing eating his first catch.
“Eww,” Echo said, scrunching her nose as Charlie’s teeth crunched the skull of the animal and gulped it down.
He needed to eat, but did it have to be like that? She decided that it was better if Charlie found his own food from now on rather than sharing what little of her food remained. She loved Charlie and would do anything for him, but she a
lso needed food to survive.
There were no windows or doors left on the building so that anything could be waiting inside for her. She looked around at the larger animals that were peacefully eating their plants, turned back to the building, and took a deep breath as she hunched slightly, gripped her spear, and slowly entered the building.
Once inside, the layout of the building proved this was not a medical center. Dirt, rain, and plants had managed to work their way into the building as if there were no walls at all. Light footsteps echoed from the floors above, and Charlie set off in search for more fun and food. There were former offices on the ground floor. Whatever had been in them during the building’s former life were long gone.
Echo shrieked when she turned the corner and ran into a large creature that was happily eating leaves growing up the hallway walls. It looked at her with a blank expression, but in her mind, it was laughing at her terrified expression. She started chuckling as she realized neither her nor the animal meant harm to the other. Slowly and cautiously she reached out and touched the animal as it returned to eating. Its skin twitched under her touch, but it did not run away or attack her, which made her very happy and very curious.
There was nothing like this animal in her city. It was large, almost as tall as she was, with light brown and tan skin. Its four legs were thin and spindly and didn’t look like they should be able to support the animal’s body, but they did. As she continued to pet the animal, her heart rate slowed, and she felt as calm as she did back home in her bed laying down after a good night’s rest. Like the anghenbeast, this one also had three eyes, but it also had long droopy ears that hung well below its mouth making it look more funny than scary. Two small bony nubs stuck out the top of its head. She wondered if this was a young animal or an old one. Regardless, she enjoyed petting it and could have stayed there all day except Charlie began growling from somewhere within the building which quickly brought her back to her current situation.
Fearing for her friend, Echo grabbed her spear and bolted up the stairs. She leaped over the holes formed by destructive plants and started calling for Charlie. She found him on the second floor playing with a short, plump, black, furry animal that ran away as soon as it spotted Echo. She leaned on her spear and started laughing. She didn’t know how much more of this excitement she could take.
“Come on, Charlie. I think we should stick together for a while.”
Together the pair explored the hallways and rooms on the second floor. The former purpose of the building remained hidden until they reached the third floor. Little remained of the roof, so they had plenty of light to look around the open room. Scattered hand tools and metal tables bolted to the floor now stand as rusted reminders of what took place here. Echo saw rooms like this on her field trips. In her city, this was a machine shop where they produced and repaired equipment. She picked up a rusted wrench off the floor and assumed this room’s purpose might have been the same. Not seeing much use for the room and its rusted tools, she threw the wrench in a corner creating a spark.
“Charlie! Did you see that?”
She hurried over to the corner, picked up the wrench and tossed it again, but nothing happened this time. She struck everything she could find until she struck it against a small black rock and produced another spark. She was beside herself with giddiness.
“Fire! We can make fire. Oh, Charlie! You know what this means?”
Tears welled up as the knowledge that she now had the means to create a spark and plenty of plants to burn meant she now had access to fire. She thought about the animal in the hallway downstairs and the others around the city. Meat. She had access to meat. Fire. If this created a spark, then surely other things in the city could create sparks as well. Fire plus meat meant food. Proper food. Granted, it was not the protein loaves her school provided, but she was sure that the animals in the city could act like the protein roasts her mother prepared once a month for a treat. She leaned against the wall and looked out what once was a window at the city surrounding her. So much to see. So much to find. So much time to do it in. If the animals found safety here, so would she. She had food, shelter, and the only thing missing was water, but she was sure there was water somewhere, just waiting for her to find it. It may not be perfect, but it was home.
Three months had passed since Echo and Charlie first saw the city from the top of its protective wall that had weathered away to a stub. She set up camp in an office on the first floor of the machine shop and marked the sunrises on a wall. Charlie hunted the small animals that lived in the undergrowth while Echo chose to live off fruits and vegetables that grew in patches throughout this part of the city. On her second day in the city, she had found an old knife that still had a working blade so she spent most of that day sharpening her spears into actual weapons that she could use against the predators. So far, nothing had entered this part of the city as far as she could tell, which made it seem even more like home. Three months of calm.
Her clothing was tattered and frayed, and the morning air had turned cool. Without warmer clothing, she would not survive the winter. Over the last three months, she learned more about the animals in this part of the city and learned where they all liked to live. The small, black, furry animal that Charlie found their first day in the city lived ten streets over where the buildings had collapsed and formed an artificial caving system. They were no longer small though. They were now large, lumbering creatures that preferred eating the plant eaters more than playing with Charlie. She named them cavers.
Echo didn’t like the idea of taking an animal’s life, but she had one occasion killed one of the ones she met in that very building on her first day. She named them greeners because they only ate the green parts of the plants. She named most of the animals she found based on where they lived or what they ate. Over time, she accepted that everything needed to eat and if you didn’t eat plants, you ate animals who ate the plants. She was food to the anghenbeast, but she vowed to not be easy pickings. Today though, she must kill. She must find a way to make warmer clothing or else she would die regardless of how many fires she set.
She sat from her perch on the first floor and watched as a large caver came into the street looking for an easy meal. Echo grabbed her spear and headed downstairs to begin the hunt. Charlie was off somewhere playing or finding his own food, but he returned every evening to the safety of her side. The caver had its eyes set on a young greener that had been born just a few days earlier. This was her chance. As the caver hunted its prey, she hunted the caver. As the caver leaped, Echo threw her spear, and the young greener fled unharmed. Echo apologized as the caver lay dying but shed no tears. She rarely cried now. Not when frightened, or sad, or lonely. Not even when she had to use an old tool to remove a tooth. Pain, fear, and loneliness were just facts of life now. As much a part of her life as school, tests, and friends had been.
When the caver took its last breath, she dragged the animal into her home and skinned it. She removed some of the outer meat for her dinner that night, tossed its innards into the street for the small scavengers that only come out at night, and left the rest of the carcass in one of the offices to dry. She hung the caver’s skin in an empty window frame so the afternoon sun the following day could dry it faster. In a few days, she would be able to make a blanket at least, but it seemed large enough for some type of coat. She watched the sun set lower in the sky and lit the fire for the night. The smell of cooking meat brought Charlie happily back home for a good meal and great company. She never felt more at home, more alive, or more in control than she had those last three months, but that sense of control and safety quickly dissipated as the howls of the anghenbeast echoed through the city.
Echo grabbed Charlie and hung onto him by the shoulders as they watched six anghenbeasts come into view. It had been months since fear and terror rose from her depths, and she had forgotten how difficult it was to think, to reason, when your body was trembling. Her mouth felt dry and she desperately just wanted
the anghenbeast to find a large greener or caver to satisfy them and not explore her home any further. What if they found her? What if they found Charlie? She turned back to the window and looked down into the street. She had killed one before. She would do it again. She had to.
Echo had several advantages now that she didn’t have three months earlier at the cave. She had fire and proper spears fashioned from wood poles with metal shards impaled at the tip. They were deadly. And so was she. She leaned by the window, controlled her breathing and stuffed her fear of what was to come in a little pouch and threw it into the dark recesses of her mind. The prey had become the hunter.
Quickly she gathered her spears and unlit torches and went to the other side of the workshop that overlooked the main corridor below. Growls and grunts echoed through the city as the anghenbeast approached. The scent of cavers and greeners out looking for their evening meals filled their nostrils. Echo smiled, hoping one or more of the anghenbeast would find them more appetizing than her. A young greener had the misfortune of scampering into the open and became dinner for one of them. She never knew that greeners made crying noises, but that one did as the anghenbeast lunged and crushed its chest with one bite. The city filled with sounds she had never heard before. All were sending out warnings of the coming storm. Unfortunately, the calls also stoked Charlie’s protective instincts, and he began barking at the unseen enemy. The lead anghenbeast stopped as soon as Charlie began barking and cocked its head from side to side, listening, locating, and with a snarled growl, began leading the remaining pack towards her home.
She watched as they came closer, then lit two torches in the fire she made on the metal table every night for light and returned to the window where Charlie was still pacing and barking at thin air.
“Wait…they need to be closer.” She stood perched above them where there could not see. She hoped they couldn’t see her, at least. “Now!”