“Take a gander, Soldier. You’ve got to know what a Fluke looks like. You’re going to be fighting plenty.”
I approached the slit opening that was about the height of my shoulder. This had been designed so musket men could fire at the enemy outside without being hit when, or if, the bad guys returned fire. If this really was the shooting kind of war.
I looked out. Yes, I remembered this from when I arrived. There, in front of me, was the place they called the Factory Floor. That strange landscape stretched out for mile after mile. Hundreds of machines were laid out in neat lines. Pistons went up and down. Silver wheels that were bigger than houses spun around and around. I saw turning cranks, drive shafts, cogs, differentials. Steel beams rocked on central pivots. I heard the faint rumble of those monster engines.
And then there was greenery, too. Some of the factory machines were swamped by green vines. From plenty of walkways huge trees stretched up toward the roof. I gazed in astonishment at the huge lake, where flocks of white birds glided in to land on the water. Identifying where the light came from wasn’t easy. Of course, there was no sun, the Factory Floor was indoors. There were no lamps, either. The light seemed to come from the mist that hung just beneath the ceiling. Those clouds of vapor appeared to be luminous, shedding a milky-white light.
“See anything?” Mott asked.
“I see the Factory Floor, machines, lake…”
“Do you see the Fluke?”
“I don’t know what one is.”
“Look for a twist of white fog.”
“I still can’t see it.”
The boy in the spectacles shouted out from the back of the bunker. “It’s in grid A4!” He sounded excited, as if he anticipated dramatic events.
“A4?” I asked. “What’s A4?”
“We’ve divided up the Factory Floor into a grid pattern and overlaid it onto a floor plan,” Mott told me. “A4 is there.” His face turned grim. “Right in front of you.”
My heart lurched. I twisted my head to look out again.
The Fluke stood just outside the slit in the concrete. A twist of fog, slowly rotating. My eyes focused on that ten-foot pillar of vapor. There were threads of red fire running through its whiteness.
“Aren’t you going to kill it?” I asked. My eyes locked onto the twist of fog. Those scarlet veins of fire…amazing, hypnotic…compelling. I wanted to keep staring. In fact, I couldn’t turn away if I tried. “No…don’t kill it yet…let me watch it for a while…” My heart slowed; a relaxed, dreamy feeling sidled through me. “It’s amazing…Flukes are beautiful…” I heard the sneeze sound from the gun. The pellet exploded inside the misty body of the Fluke; liquid nitrogen splashed against the floor. It also enveloped the rotating column of white that was the Fluke creature.
The extreme cold of the frozen gas—a piercing minus three hundred and twenty degrees Fahrenheit—transformed the vapor into glittering ice crystals. They pitter-pattered down onto the concrete floor. Those threads of red fire inside the being turned duller and duller…then died.
I sagged, panting, against the wall. A choking sound came from my throat. My heart squelched strangely in my chest.
Mott caught hold of me. “I’m sorry to do that to you, John. But I wanted you to experience, firsthand, how those things can mess with your mind. You need to understand what you’re up against.”
I slumped down to sit on the floor. Sweat poured out of me. I couldn’t speak.
“You’ve just gone and met a Fluke,” Mott said. “Now you know your enemy.”
From Bastion Wars:
The artillery guns in Bastion were big. Cajun pot roast dinners were big. The dormitories were big. Biggest of all was the alarm. One combatant still remembers the electrifying effect when the alarm sounded: “The alarm was the big noise. When it signaled the attack alert, the siren filled every cubic inch of space. The walls shook. That sound would be big enough to drown out the clatter of the universe tumbling down on Doomsday. When the alarm started you moved fast. Everyone to station. Everyone ready to fight. The alarm was the biggest thing. The alarm was your God Almighty.”
* * *
—
The siren came. To me it sounded like a visitation from God. The wail rose from a deep bass sound that shook your stomach to a high-pitched scream that threatened to explode your skull.
Everyone ran from the canteen. I’d been chewing on a chicken drumstick and asking myself why Mott had let the Fluke get so close to me. Had he done it so I could be safely exposed to its mind-scrambling powers? Or had he done it just for fun? Just to watch me go all weird and bug-eyed?
The siren stopped me wondering about Mott’s intention. Damn it, the siren made the water jugs vibrate so much the water jumped right out.
The boy soldiers threw down their forks, their chicken drumsticks, their chunks of bread, and they just ran. This wasn’t chaos. This had been well rehearsed. The warriors were racing to action stations. Within moments they’d man the weapons, then they’d engage the enemy.
“Fight! Fight Fight!” guys chanted as they ran. “Fight! fight!”
I flung down the chicken limb. I started to run, too.
The siren screamed. It poured all its violent decibels onto me. The siren got inside my head. The alarm shrieked so hugely inside of me that I didn’t have room for thought. The tidal wave of noise caught me and carried me along.
Guys in camouflage gear pounded along the underground road. They raced up the stairs to corridors that would take them to the bunkers and the cupolas. The guns would be waiting, primed and ready. Soon the shooting would start.
Time for me to run, too. I climbed the same stairs. I knew exactly where I was going.
I’m getting out! I told myself this over and over. If one thought managed to overpower the mind-melting howl of the siren, this was it: I’m getting out! I’m leaving! I’m going home!
Everyone ran to their posts. If they noticed me at all, they’d assume I did the same. No doubt Mott would be in the musketry bunker, also assuming that one John Karroon would be heading that way along with the rest of his comrades. Then they would fight the unholy Fluke.
Boots clattered on the floor. Guys in uniform barreled along. Pens fell out of pockets. Nobody paused to retrieve them. Reaching their posts—that was the most important task in those kids’ lives right now.
I continued to ascend the staircases. When the staircases ended I climbed up a ladder that was bolted to the wall. I hadn’t known it was going to be there. Instinct was my guide at that moment. Blind instinct.
Out! Out! Out!
“I’m going home!” My shout echoed up the shaft.
The concrete tube was featureless, apart from the rusty iron ladder bolted to its side. I climbed and climbed. My legs ached like fury. I might have ascended by five or six hundred feet when the ladder ended at a circular chamber. A single hatchway had been set into the concrete wall. I pulled back half a dozen bolts that sealed the hatch shut, then hauled it open.
A stink of damp gushed over me in a wave. There was heat there. This was like a warm breath from a huge animal blasting its reeking lung air into my face. Still, I didn’t hesitate.
Quickly, I stepped through the hatch and into the darkness.
Then I stood there, trying to make sense of what little I could see. Panting, I stepped to one side to let more of the light trickle through the hatchway.
The walls of the tunnel were black. They’d been roughly cut from rock. I took a dozen paces along the tunnel. I made out timber props and braces for the roof. A shovel lay against one wall. I could see iron tracks running along the tunnel—the kind that miners would use to move ore. The tracks disappeared under a mound of rubble that blocked the tunnel.
I retraced my route. There’d be a way out if I followed the t
unnel the other way. I was certain of it.
Nope.
The tunnel was blocked by what looked like a million tons of stones, too.
Stupid little noises came running up my throat. I was crying.
Fucking crying!
Twelve years old and I cried like a little kid.
I was crying because I knew there was no way out of Bastion. I was trapped.
I sat down on one of the iron rails and bawled.
From Bastion Wars:
Bastion existed for defense. Its purpose: to protect the lives of its inhabitants. One of the boys’ roles was to keep the machines on the Factory Floor clear of vines. This parasitic vegetation would foul moving parts. The worst plant for this was viper ivy. Any veteran from Bastion will always utter “viper ivy” with a particular bitterness. Stories about the extraordinary plant are a recurring feature of the oral testimonies. The reader of this history will discover more surprises about that invasive green menace.
So detachments of boys ventured out onto the Factory Floor. They courageously faced its dangers. They did their work, cutting away strangling vines, then returned to the fortress complex that is Bastion.
Yet not a single boy knew what the factory machines did. They did not know who benefited from all that hardware. Or what the consequences would be if the gigantic wheels, cogs, and drive shafts stopped turning.
* * *
—
Two hundred or more faces surrounded me. Every single one blazed with fury.
They were yelling: “Deserter!” “Coward!”
Shouting voices, faces, anger—that pretty much summed up the situation. The only one who didn’t express anger was Mott. He stared at me in disbelief. You can add a hefty portion of disappointment to that expression, too.
“Why the hell did you try and leave Bastion?” He’d asked the question a dozen times by now.
The din in the canteen from shouting boys always drowned out my answer.
“Coward!”
“Deserter!”
“Shove him out onto the Factory Floor!”
“Let the Flukes take care of him!”
Mott grabbed me by the arm. “John, explain why you wanted to leave us.”
“Because this is insane!” I yelled. “Why are you here? You’re not real soldiers.”
That killed the shouts of “Deserter” and “Coward!”
“You’re not real soldiers,” I repeated. “You’re just kids in uniform.”
This really shocked the crowd. Just ten minutes ago they had surrounded me when I’d returned to the canteen after stand-down and announced, “There’s no way out of here. We must be hundreds of feet underground.” Then I told them about my trip to the mine workings above our heads.
The revelation that I’d tried to scarper unleashed the tidal wave of fury. They hated me for wanting to go home.
“We are soldiers,” protested a kid in spectacles. “Plenty of us have died protecting this place.”
“And each other,” added another pint-sized warrior.
Hundreds of eyes were fixed on me. Get this. They weren’t being bullies, they weren’t being casually vicious for the fun of it. These people were genuinely hurt by my accusation that they were fake soldiers. They were so proud of their status. What’s more, they’d been prepared to invest their trust and friendship in me. Now I’d scorned them. I’d treated them like shit.
Mott glared at me. I’d thrown friendship back in his face, too. He must have found my behavior inexplicable. “I thought you were acting strange because your head was still scrambled. New arrivals are always like that. But it only lasts a few hours. You should be over that now.”
He looked like a sixteen-year-old, but inside that red head of his there seemed to be an adult living there. A grown-up in the skin of a kid. Weird. His manner unsettled me.
I felt the tears come back. No more crying. No fucking way. I clenched my fists. Tried to stop the wet stuff springing from my eyes in such a shameful way.
“Listen.” I took a deep breath. “I know you’re doing your best here.”
“You know nothing,” hissed the kid in spectacles. “You’re thick as mule shit.”
“I want to explain…”
“Coward!”
“Deserter!”
The anger storm came roaring back. They wanted to lynch me. I was the defective animal in the pack. They recognized me as being a danger to them, in ways they couldn’t fully explain.
Oh…but I would be a danger to them. I planned to rip their proud delusion to shreds. This belief that they were noble warriors protecting the king’s castle, or whatever Bastion was. This pathetic belief that they were somehow fighting a glorious, holy war.
I waited for the bedlam to subside just a bit, then held up a hand for silence the way teachers do. That did the trick (to my surprise); bedlam evaporated.
In the silence that followed I started talking in a calm, deliberate voice. A here-comes-the-truth kind of tone. “When I first arrived here, I believed I was dreaming. Everything was mixed up in my head. I know I’m not dreaming now. Bastion is real. You are real. I’ve seen the machines on the Factory Floor. Your job is to protect them and to keep them working. The question is: What are these machines for?”
Mott answered, “They’re important. Vitally important.”
“Okay,” I said, “but what do they do? What are they making?”
“We don’t know what they actually make. We don’t need to know. What we do know is that there’d be a huge disaster if they stopped.”
“So who owns the machines?”
“We do…well…” He frowned. “The population, I guess.”
“What population?”
“Everyone outside Bastion.”
A certain vagueness crept into his voice. I decided to apply more pressure with some harder questions: “Do you think it’s okay for those people, who get whatever stuff is made in the factory, to expect you to risk your lives to keep the machines going?”
“That’s our mission.”
“So it’s all right to exploit children as soldiers?’
“We are real soldiers. We’re proud of what we do.”
Now for the killer questions. Before anyone could start shouting again I asked, “Why do you all suffer from such a shit-poor memory?”
“Our memories work fine,” said the kid in spectacles.
“Okay, answer me this: What’s your mother’s name?”
He laughed. “Of course I know my mother’s name. It’s…” Suddenly he looked as if he’d vomit. “It’s…” He got all panicky…agitated. His eyes started to search the floor in front of him as if he’d find his mother’s name chiseled there. It was disturbing to watch that desperation on his face.
“You.” I pointed at a big kid with a scar on his forehead. “Where did you go to school?”
“I…I…” That’s all he could say. He pushed his fist against his mouth and began to shake.
I picked another boy. “Name the town where you grew up.”
“It’s…shit. It’s…” His voice became a croak.
My finger stabbed at kids at random. “Tell me the name of your first pet…What’s your father called?…Do you have brothers…Do you have sisters…What make of car does your family own?…Name some of your teachers when you were at school…Can you name any teachers? Can you name a single teacher that taught you?”
I fired questions at them. No answers came back.
I turned to Mott. “Tell me your father’s name.”
“What does it matter?” He got angry. “We don’t need our mothers and fathers now. We have a mission. We look after each other. We are warriors. And we do not need someone like you coming along to screw up
our lives here.”
“But what happened to your memories?” My voice rose, too. Forget cool, forget poise. Anger blasted through me. “None of you can remember your old lives before you got here. I can. My name is John Karroon. I’m twelve. I live in Perryvale. My mother’s called Catherine; my Dad’s Ben. We have a Mercedes. It’s poop-brown, it’s twenty years old, and my dad tells everyone it’s a classic. He won’t even drive it in the rain. My mother drives a Nissan. My sister’s called Joy. She keeps rabbits—Cherokee, Sunspot, Sweetbell, Flighty are their names.” The anger got the better of me: I went around the circle of boys and started pushing them in their chests, knocking them back. “So why don’t any of you idiots remember anything? Why don’t you know the names of your own parents? Why can’t you tell me what they call your schools? Is it because they’re putting something in your food? Chemicals that make you forget? Have they cut part of your fucking brains out?”
“John.” Mott spoke softly. “That’s enough.”
“And what happened to Casie Fitton, the kid who got stung? He vanished from his bed last night and nobody cares he’s gone but me!”
“John—”
“Nobody questions what’s happened to him or whether he’s still alive but me!”
Mott grabbed me. “The verdict of this military court has been reached.”
I stared at him. “What military court?”
“John Karroon. You have been found guilty. Now you will be punished.”
From Bastion Wars:
Stories from Bastion are often harrowing. Many are horrific. There are a few that are funny. The astute reader will recognize that even the lighthearted anecdotes are bittersweet. They illuminate the inner minds of the boys.
Take this example:
From six in the evening until ten there was television. Programs appeared on televisions that were set up in recreation rooms. The boys didn’t know who made the broadcasts. They simply enjoyed the cartoons, comedy shows, and Tonite’s Movie. The boys loved war and monster films. “The bloodier the better,” recalled a veteran. One way to drive the boys out of the recreation rooms in a mass of indignation was to play a romantic comedy onscreen. The boys didn’t want to see “any stupid picture about people kissing.”
Volume Ten Page 4