by S. O. Green
Ness advised Faith to stick close, but she didn’t need to. The girl was glued to her hip, and every time she looked back she flashed a soft smile of encouragement.
The doors had been chained up decades ago. They stepped through an empty frame, boots crunching glass. Ness swept the flashlight Harlon had gifted them across the interior. Dust motes danced in the beam. Weeds between the tiles, ivy on the walls, stagnant ponds where fountains used to be, and a few dozen rusted shutters. Any one of them could have hidden a goldmine. Or a Reaper.
She tried to remember what the faded names above the stores meant. Some were useful—clothes, food, drink—others not so much. Once, she’d cracked open a unit in a place like this and found dozens and dozens of electronic appliances, each as heavy and water-damaged as the last—washing machines, dryers, fridges.
Maybe people had felt safe enough owning those things, once upon a time, but imagining lugging even one of them around made her queasy. They were anchors now, nothing more, and they’d drag you all the way to the bottom.
“This one,” Ness said, and used her tire iron to break the padlock off a unit with a picture of a mountain on its sign. “Get yourself a new look. I’ll see if I can find us some food. Then we can go looking for gas.”
“Will there be gas here?”
“Places like this used to have about a million visitors a day and just about all of them had cars, so yeah, some place would have been selling gas.”
She yanked up the shutter and looked around the store’s darkened interior. Racks of hard-wearing hiker’s clothes, ski poles, boots and rucksacks. They even had a kiddie section. Perfect.
“Whatever you want, it’s yours. Once you’re ready, grab a bag and come find me.”
Faith turned to marvel at the outfit choices and Ness caught her by the wrist.
“If anything happens, you scream bloody murder until I get there, understand?”
The girl gave a hesitant nod. Confident that she indeed understood, Ness snatched a rucksack from the rack and strode deeper into the mall, on the hunt for the kind of prey that came in cans.
She popped a couple more shutters, shuddering at the extravagant blooms of mold that had once been fresh food or badly sealed containers. The stagnant reek made her throat close in protest. One unit, signed as ‘Nursery Days’, turned out to be full of baby clothes and toys instead of seeds and gardening tools the way she expected. Part of her had hoped to find a flourishing orchard behind the steel.
She studied the shelves for a moment, wondering what an age-appropriate toy for a fourteen-year-old girl in the post-Reaping days looked like. She picked a plastic bracelet off a spinning stand. ‘Faith’ engraved on glittery, rainbow polyhedrons. She tucked it in her pocket and didn’t even bother to look for her own name.
She had a good feeling about the fifth unit she cracked. The sign was camo-painted and covered in stars. Sure enough, when she dragged the shutter up, the place was full of military surplus—tents, sleeping bags, knives, crossbows. She’d age another year before she got through taking inventory of the place.
“Gonna need a bigger truck,” she muttered, throwing down her rucksack and going straight for the MREs stacked in the back.
She crammed food and a couple of canteens into the bag, added sleeping bags for the inevitability of unconsciousness, and buckled a hunting knife to her thigh. She hadn’t had a brand new blade in ever.
This was the conflict every wanderer of the Reaped world faced at one point or another. Travel light, or accrue stuff. Travel light? Accrue stuff? Honestly, she could see the appeal of both.
No wonder materialism had been so popular.
She was browsing crossbows, trying to gauge the draw poundage that would give the best penetration of a Reaper’s skull, when she heard footsteps out in the mall proper, echoing through the empty halls.
It wasn’t Faith. Too heavy, too rhythmic. She was pretty sure that girl skipped everywhere. This was the sound of someone marching in solid soles.
Ness hadn’t heard that gait in a long time. Not long enough. She snatched her rucksack and slung it over one shoulder on her way out the door, as cold fear raked its claws down her spine.
“Shit,” she grunted, winding her way back to where she’d left Faith. “Shit, shit, shit…”
She was halfway to the store with the hiking gear when she turned a corner and almost collided with Faith. Her hand dipped for the pistol in her waistband before she could stop herself.
“Ready to go shopping!” Faith said brightly, holding up a rucksack that was optimistically as big as Ness’s.
She’d changed into a thick, canvas jacket, a pair of cargo pants and hiking boots, and she’d snagged a baseball cap from somewhere that was just as meaningless as the one Ness wore. Her enthusiasm faltered when she saw the look in Ness’s eyes, and turned to alarm when she dragged her by the wrist into the shadow of a door marked ‘Employees Only’.
“What’s going on?” she whispered.
“We’re not alone.”
“Reapers?”
Ness nodded. It was true; it just wasn’t the half of it.
“But… You can fight Reapers. You did it before. It’s…easy for you.”
“Not this time. This time, we run. Take my hand and don’t let go, and don’t stop until we’re back at the truck.”
“We need supplies, don’t we?”
“You know why the Big Seven destroyed the old world? Because people couldn’t let go. They sat in their houses with all their shit around them until it was too late to run and then they died like fucking kings of ancient Egypt, with all their mountains of crap still piled up around them. Sometimes, you have to let go.”
Understanding slowly bloomed in Faith’s expression. She nodded. Ness grabbed her hand until her knuckles went white and started running.
They burst back out into the corridor, pelting towards the broken window they’d climbed through, past the units filled with kaleidoscope growths of mold and the baby store and the hiker’s paradise where Faith had dressed herself up like Ness’s prettier little sister.
She heard the footsteps again, echoing behind her. They quickened in pace. Her heart leapt into her throat, panic rising with the tempo of her pulse.
They weren’t going to make it.
“Vanessa!”
The voice filled the building to its rust-speckled rafters, not a shout but a command, and the terror almost paralyzed her.
“Go!” she ordered, shoving Faith ahead. “Don’t look back!”
She spun, pistol drawn. Their stalker was a silhouette in the light filtering from the shattered panes above, striding inexorably after them, looming and muscled, the only color, the only detail, a pair of gleaming red eyes.
She fired. The shadow streaked to the side, vanishing through a side door. Ness bolted. She dropped into a baseball slide through the broken window, saw Faith leaning from the truck’s passenger door, relief warring with terror in her expression.
She threw the rucksack—one, measly rucksack from the whole building—into the bed, wrenched the driver door open and dragged herself behind the wheel. She stamped the gas pedal and they roared away from the mall, a plume of dust billowing out behind them.
She didn’t let up on the accelerator until the image of the building in their rear-view was nothing but a memory.
But wasn’t that the point? Memories could always come back to haunt you.
Chapter Five
The Beautiful
“Pay no mind to the words from the mouths of Reapers. They are the fading echoes of past lives. They may look like people you know. People you love. Heck, they may look like people. But these are not God’s children any longer. They are but empty vessels, given over to house demons, and if they do not try to take your spirit through force, they will tempt you to break your spirit through sin. Then, you will
become as empty and as wicked as they are. Keep the Faith. Embrace the Struggle.”
“I don’t get it,” Faith said, screwing down the radio volume. “What did you see? Why did you look so scared?”
Ness drummed her fingers on the steering wheel, fighting the temptation to crank the music back up and drive tight-lipped and angry until they reached Archangel.
It had to be a coincidence, him showing up again. Maybe it could have had something to do with the girl, her unique power, but he’d never cared about politics. No, this was all an unhappy accident. She was pretty sure of that.
“Everyone has a past,” she said. “Sometimes, it catches up to you.”
“And you’re running away? That doesn’t sound much like you.”
Ness sniggered. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, kid. Nice outfit, by the way.”
Faith checked the clothes she’d picked out at the mall and flushed. “Did I do okay? I don’t know what people wear when they’re on a road trip.”
“Little different from your church clothes, huh?”
“Those weren’t my church clothes; they were just my…clothes.”
“You look just fine. Even if you are horning in on my racket.”
She tugged at the peak of Faith’s cap. She giggled and swatted her away. The laughter felt better than the uneasy tension that had dogged them all the way from the mall. Ness adjusted the wing mirror and gave one last, long look to make sure they weren’t being followed, then resolved to leave the incident at the mall where it belonged: behind her.
“Got something for you,” Ness said, fishing out the colorful bracelet from her jacket pocket.
“For me?” Faith inspected it, face lighting up. “It’s got my name on it! How did you-?”
“I just found it in the mall. Figured you might like it. Guess Faith was a popular name even before the Reaping.”
She watched the girl slip the bracelet on, still marveling at it, and hid a smile. She wished that moment could last forever, but they had new problems developing.
She tapped the fuel gauge. “Shit. We’re redlining.”
“Gas?”
“Yeah. Which leaves us with two options. Find gas or find a new ride with gas in it.”
“I take it we won’t make it if we try to walk the rest of the way to Archangel?”
She didn’t want to make her feel bad, but Ness couldn’t help but laugh. “Do you like having feet?”
Faith peered at the map Harlon had given them. It didn’t just mark the mall, but a few other places too. Ness wondered if he’d scouted them all from the farmhouse, or if it was a relic from his own days as a wanderer. How accurate could it be?
“This could be a gas station, right?” the girl asked eventually, pointing at a marker on the road ahead.
Ness glanced at it. An arrow and a circle. The word ‘Gas?’
“Great. I love question marks.”
Even so, she was desperate enough to try.
They weaved through the rubble from a crumbled overpass, past a field of wrecks in the other lane, stuck waiting to escape Topeka, lying broken on the horizon. The drivers were still there, skeletal and weathered as their vehicles. A swathe wider than the interstate had been cut through the city center, the buildings shouldered aside like corn stalks. Ness wondered which of the Big Seven had flattened this place, what these people had felt crawling into their brains before they died.
She’d seen sights like this a few times before. The enormity of it hit you in the guts the first time, then it just made you feel tired and small and pointless. Finally, you just stopped looking.
Faith looked. She took in every morbid, grotesque detail—the bones and rags and rust and ash—like looking away would dishonor the dead who’d been given no cremation.
“Did the Reapers…?”
“Probably. I don’t know much about the war. Before my time. But I heard it was anarchy. Big Seven destroying all the major cities, Reapers appearing everywhere, killing people, stealing souls. Whatever they use them for, some of them must be sitting pretty nowadays after places like this.”
They rolled past the bone yard, but Faith’s eyes followed it in the wing mirror for another mile. Then they reached the marker on Harlon’s map.
It wasn’t a gas station. It was a hotel—the kind of place that’d once had Michelin stars and charity galas, celebrity photo ops and fashion shows—and it still gleamed with all that luster, even in this grimy, gritty wasteland. Unbroken glass, uncrumbled stone, unplundered resources. Armed guards patrolling the grounds in sharp, black uniforms, gilded doors revolving idly, banners bearing an emblem of a narrow, green eye fluttering in the breeze. Ness stared, just as long and hard as Faith.
There were people in the lobby and in the windows. Languid movement, like predators at rest.
“We’re not stopping here,” Ness said.
“But we need gas, right?”
“Not this badly.”
“Shouldn’t we at least talk to them. I mean, they’re human, aren’t they? Like us?”
“Kid, a building like this, in a world like this? I don’t know what these people are, but it ain’t nothing like human.”
She started up the truck. It was time to leave. But at the corner ahead, a jeep rolled out in front them, repurposed ex-military with more of the black-clad soldiers riding in it. The man riding shotgun pointed down, advising her to kill the engine.
Before Ness could throw the truck into reverse, either to find another route or get distance to ram them, another jeep blocked their path.
“Shit…”
Ness reached for her pistol. Half a dozen rifles locked on her and she lifted her hands back onto the wheel. Her new friend slid out of the vehicle ahead and sauntered up to her window. He stopped to kick the front tire on the way past, like he was a grease monkey about to tell her about tread depth.
“Can we help you, ladies?” he asked, leaning against the door.
“We were looking for gas, that’s all,” Ness said, because why not tell the truth? “Don’t mean to pry. We were just about to move on, if you don’t mind.”
“And what brings you out this way?”
“Sin Chasers.”
He arched an eyebrow. “The girl too?”
“She’s my navigator.”
“Well, you’re not related. No resemblance. So you’re, what, one orphan looking out for another?”
“That any of your business?”
Any good humor in his voice and in his eyes evaporated like spit off hot blacktop. “Everyone who comes this way is my business. This place isn’t for just anyone. People who’ve seen us are a liability.”
Ness considered her response. She settled on grabbing him by the collar and pulling him through the window. He swore, tried to fight her off, and she put her forge-fresh new blade under his chin so that he’d reconsider.
The guns stayed trained on her, but they wanted him alive more than they wanted her dead. Promising.
“Hold tight,” she ordered, shooting a glance at Faith.
She wrenched the gear lever and stamped the gas, sawing the wheel around. The truck lurched, clipping the corner of the jeep in front, scraping sparks. Their passenger cried out, pulling his legs clear as they roared past. He grabbed for Faith so Ness banged his head off the dash.
The blockade gunned their engines, swinging around to give chase. Still no shots fired, so she figured she’d keep hold of her captive until they’d built up enough speed to make a clean break.
“Ness, look out!” Faith screamed.
She stood on the brake, because a pair of children had just run out into the road. Tires screeched and rubber burned. Ness’s belt snapped tight around her ribcage. Faith let out a cry of pain and alarm. A moment later, a pair of military vehicles full of angry soldiers buffeted them with a one-two punch to th
e flanks. They shouted orders and dragged their kidnapped colleague out through the window.
Ness couldn’t take her eyes off the kids. They were laughing, chasing, tossing a baseball between them like they hadn’t just been run down. There were others, about a dozen in total, playing in the deserted street like it was a fenced backyard, not the doorstep of a blighted ruin. Their features were all subtly different, but there was sibling resemblance in them all.
On the verge, a woman in a flowing, white dress watched their games with an indulgent smile. Mom, because the resemblance was all hers. The soft, black hair like silk ribbons, the lean, willowy frame, the pale skin.
And the sparkle of those emerald eyes.
…
“You weren’t even remotely tempted to steal from us?” Lailah asked.
Introductions had come after the soldiers had forced her and Faith out of their truck and frog-marched them back to the hotel, Lailah and her platoon of children following in their wake. Ness had broken a man’s nose for clutching Faith’s arm so tight she cried out and cable-ties had been threatened, but Lailah had insisted they weren’t necessary. Not for ‘guests’.
Ness wondered at her definition. Real guests didn’t need to be invited in at gunpoint.
The guards had led them through the foyer, filled with gawking men and women in the finest suits and gowns the old world had been able to provide, patched and faded and frayed from forty years of constant wear. They looked like guests at a dinner party that had gone on a few decades too long. Presumably, Lailah had been the one to invite them.
“I try not to be an asshole,” Ness said, by way of explanation. “Stealing makes you an asshole, in case you didn’t know.”
Lailah chuckled. She trailed her fingers through the hair of the grinning girl sitting beside her in a way that made Ness deeply uncomfortable. She wore her children like jewels, adornments to caress and fondle for her own vanity. I am mother. Ness wondered what happened when she got bored.
Even in the eyeball-aching fluorescence of the opulent suite where she hosted them, Lailah’s beauty was radiant. Her kids, even possessed of her features, couldn’t compare. The blood of their fathers had left them subtly imperfect, and the sharp smiles and hunger in their vivid, green eyes did the rest.