“You aren’t from eh-zee,” the leader added, while striding closer. “Tell us or we’ll kill you.”
I heard a distinct gasp from several of the people on the floor.
“Gee ‘em, you can’t,” said a faraway voice from a distant bedroll.
The young man approached, and I got a good look at him despite the shadow from having the light behind him. He was tall, with broad shoulders and long hair in a ponytail. He was dark skinned, like most of the workers back home. He wore jeans and a loose-fitting vest with lots of little pockets. The shotgun in his right hand reminded me of similar weapons I’d seen from my time before going into the Complex. It was held loosely and pointed down at the floorboards of the truck.
His appearance was stern. A look reinforced when he hefted the gun, so it was in both hands, angled a little closer to us.
“Gee, no!”
Several other people shouted, too.
Gee stepped back and sighed deeply. He half-turned to his companions. “How am I ever going to get them to talk if I can’t scare them? You all have to trust me.” He completed his complaint with a word I didn’t recognize, but it felt to me like a curse word based on tone alone.
He slung the shotgun over his back and looked at us once more. “I guess you can figure out I’m not going to kill you. But try anything funny, and I’ll ignore all these wimps and do the deed, anyway.”
Still, more voices sounded in the background, as if he’d said something awful.
A young woman stepped up to be by the man’s side. “Gee ‘em tells the truth. We are bound by the law to avoid killing other Livers.” It was difficult to make out her features, either, aside from the long hair and she was a head taller than me. Her jeans and boots were similar to the man's, but her skimpy top was too revealing for my taste.
“Um, thanks,” I said with relief. “You people survived on the Outside?”
5
The couple looked at each other, then back to me. GM answered me. “Of course we've survived. But it hasn't been easy. You should worry more about yourselves. You shouldn't be out here snooping. How did you get on this side, anyway?” He’d dropped the gun back down to his one hand, making it less likely he was going to shoot us. I think we all relaxed.
“We came from the Complex,” Wen replied, before I could stop her.
The two forms remained still.
“The Complex?” she repeated. “You’ve never heard of it?”
“We know only of the Bag People living in the rock across the river.” He pointed to somewhere outside the truck, though I had no way of knowing what direction that meant. “Beyond them, we don’t know. Our Tribe comes up to the lake from our home to the south. We—” he seemed to reconsider. “We have our reasons for being here.”
“So you aren’t going to kill us? Mind if we sit down?” Alex pointed to some crates along the wall. “We’ve been walking all day.”
GM held us there, clearly considering if it was safe. Finally, he motioned us all and stepped aside. I saw him in the better light. His features were strange and unlike anyone inside the Complex. His companion shared his dark skin tone, and I suspected they were as different from me as Wen and Hui were. Though they weren’t like Wen.
When we sat down, three in a row, our captors lined up as if to get a better look at us. It became apparent they were all of the same tribe. The couple continued to stand in front of us, but they were flanked by most of the other occupants. I realized most of them were very young. Teens, and below. It had been a long time since I’d seen anyone younger than me, at least in appearance.
A fifty-year-old was younger than me, at least in years.
“I’m GM. This is Ford.” He pointed to the young woman. “We’re leaders of the Young Guard. The others out there,” he pointed to a different wall of the truck, “are the Old Guard. You’re lucky we found you. They aren’t as friendly as us.”
Chuckles echoed from around the crowd.
“You’re all kids,” I blurted.
“I’m thirty-five,” GM replied with indignity. “You can’t be older ‘n seventeen,” he added.
I turned to Alex on my right. He could have been reading my mind. GM didn’t look a day older than me. Something had screwed with his aging, same as ours—only not as bad.
Alex unloaded on them. “We’re all almost a hundred.”
Murmurs of surprise.
“It’s true.” We’d been in the Complex for eighty-seven years, and I’d walked in as a teenager. I had to be at least one hundred, probably several years older than even that number.
“Prove it,” GM demanded.
Alex looked at me with a smile, then turned back. “I forgot my wallet. How about if I tell you what I was doing eighty years ago?”
Without waiting for approval, he continued. “I lived in a big city in a building that touched the sky. My family and I all had a view of the sea and we were happy. Then, a terrible snowball ruined the world. The virus was unleashed upon us. It began with sirens. Endless sirens. When they finally stopped, the virus had spread to all my family and friends. So I ran. I flew. My group was hundreds strong when we went into the desert heat. It was just me and a few others when we finally crossed it. We were taken in by a harsh man. He saved us, but I had to live every day for eighty-seven-years thinking about all that I’d left behind. So when you tell me to prove it, I have nothing but words as proof. What do you have? Can you prove you’ve walked the earth for thirty-five years? You look the same age as us.” As he leaned back against the wall, he crossed his arms in open defiance.
“You are an Original? You were there—at the End?” GM took a knee in front of us. “Only the Tribal elders can lay claim to be Originals. And they look nothing like you. They are used up and half-dead.”
“You mean they’re elderly.” I offered them a new word, as they looked at me with blank faces.
GM turned my way. “We don’t have a word for them, other than Original.”
“Are they in the other truck?”
Giggles from the pack.
“No. They can’t leave our home,” Ford responded with a friendly smile.
“Where’s that?” I asked.
Her smile vanished.
“I didn’t—No. I’m not trying to find it. I’d just like to know. We’re, uh, trying to find our own Originals. They were stolen from us.”
That caused a stir. GM waved his hand to quiet everyone down. “The Originals are the soul of our Tribe. To steal an Original is to steal our essence. You have our sympathies and be assured it was not us.”
“We know,” I replied. “Our own leader ran off with them.”
The place descended into bedlam.
It took GM a while to calm them. He looked at the three of us up and down the row but settled on me. In all the commotion he’d taken Ford’s hand, which I found touching.
“I’m sorry. The Red Sky Lands are an unforgiving place. Many forbidden places and few Livers. We respect our Originals above all else. To lose one would send us into despair. How have you managed to endure?”
Alex winked at me.
I spoke in a serious and even manner. “The three of us are on a quest to bring them back to this land. We’d be awful grateful if you could return our weapons and send us on our way so we can complete our task and restore our Tribe.”
Our weapons got returned, and there was no end of volunteers to help us find our way to find our Originals.
6
By the time we’d gotten to our feet and got our bearings, we’d been gifted two shotguns, food and water, and instructed on how to get across the river. They said it was the only way to follow the Harvester if it went onto the lake. The other side of the lake, they said over and over, was forbidden land. Too close to the old city of “Lost Vagas.” They impressed upon us how many of the Old Guard had gone there looking for help, never to return.
“You must cross the bridge, go beyond the land of the Bag Tribe, and head north over the broken lands.�
�� She pointed in the direction she meant, for which I was silently grateful. I had no idea which way was north at that moment and wouldn't until the sun rose in the east. GM assumed the Harvester would continue to the end of the lake, though he didn’t really know how far the lake went. It was outside of their tribal lands.
Wen refused a shotgun but accepted a handgun. She seemed wary. “Are you sure it’s okay to give us these guns? Won’t your people miss them?”
GM laughed. “We have trucks full of them. More than we could ever use. We make our own ammo. It’s like they were just giving these away back in the Old World. But,” he cautioned, “if our parents ever ask, make sure to tell them someone else gave them to you.”
Chuckles from his friends.
I dug into my memories, seeking anything about my forgotten parents. I figured there was something hidden there that would be triggered by his words, but my mind revealed nothing.
I appreciated the shotgun, but the feel of my staff gave me the most courage. It represented more than a weapon for me.
A crutch?
No, a talisman.
There was something special about it. I felt its power.
Inspiration struck me. I set down the shotgun and my gear and walked to the open space at the head of the truck. I began to spin the metal bar in front of me, appreciating how the blue shimmer grew as my movements became more spirited.
When I adjusted it, so the twirling staff was over my head, the entire truck watched me. I stopped and held it to the floor, afraid I’d broken some kind of regulation. The Complex was riddled with petty regulations. Enforcing them gave the Grumps things to do in otherwise endless tedium.
GM was awestruck. “Don’t stop.”
I looked at Wen and Alex, thinking how much I wanted to hand it off to her. She gave me a curt nod. Alex smiled.
“Oh. If you want me to.”
This time I started by spinning it in my strong hand on the right. I brought it in front of me and used both hands to increase the speed. I got it going so fast it was almost as bright as Wen’s efforts.
Someone turned off the green light, which cast the entire truck in darkness before the blue took over.
I continued to spin the staff, intent to light up as much of the truck as my strength would allow. I began to sweat at the exertion, but the rising level of illumination inspired me. I used both hands to thrust, spin myself, and poke the staff in various directions. To my amazement, the glow continued to increase beyond anything Wen had done.
The blue light amplified my efforts, and I gripped it with both hands and spun it in a flat arc around my body. Though it wasn’t any hotter in my hands, the burning light made me worry it was going to hurt—but I kept going, no longer caring. I had to know how bright it would get. The thing was pure magic.
My hands exploded in pain as the bar tore into the side of the truck, putting a three-foot slash in the metal. I let it go, and it fell loudly to the floor.
“Bloody hell!”
The blue flared, then dropped to almost nothing as the rod came to a rest.
“We’ll put an Elastoplast on that, lickety-split,” Alex said, not missing a beat.
Several of the younger children began to cry.
After a tense few seconds, the green light flickered back to life.
GM was in my face. “The noise. You have to go, now.”
I’m sure my look was pure confusion.
“The Old Guard will check on us. They heard that. Probably saw the blue light. They'll have questions.”
I had nothing but gratitude as Ford led the three of us out the back door, around the far side of the truck, and into the parked car wreckage. GM said his goodbyes but claimed he needed to be there to answer questions.
I ran behind Ford as she weaved expertly in and out of the rows of cars, sometimes going into tight spaces I thought had to be dead ends. The moon and stars cast enough light to see where we were going, though I was lost in seconds. She evidently knew the lands.
The expected shouts and pursuit never materialized. When we got to a safe hiding place, I tried to find out why.
“Surely they knew there were outsiders? Why didn’t your Old Guard follow us?”
“Yeah,” Wen added, “do you have weapons like this?” I could see her pointing to my staff, now a dim blue.
“GM won’t let them follow you. As leader of the Young Guard, he has that right. And no. We have an endless sea of shotguns and other black weapons, but nothing like that. What is it?”
Her question was addressed to me, but Alex answered.
“She found it in the desert.”
“Oh,” Ford whispered, no doubt unhappy with the answer. “There’s a lot I don’t understand from the Old World. Like a Mini Cooper.” She said it as if we’d understand. I’d heard the name but couldn’t place it. Alex and Wen had no response, either.
“It’s a tiny car. About one-third as large as most others. Why would anyone use such a small car when larger cars exist to carry your gear? Why didn’t everyone drive around in luxury vans? Or in the big trucks like the one we just left? That’s what I’d drive.” She laughed quietly and had apparently thought about her question a lot. I guessed she’d spent a lot of time in this parking lot.
We ran for a few more minutes. “Well, this is it,” she pointed ahead to the span of the bridge across the canyon. “You go along this ledge until you get to the highway across, then stick to the left side—right up against the barrier—until you reach the far side. Then you’ll be safe.”
“Safe from what?” Alex asked.
“The Protectors. The dam is the master of the river, but it doesn’t allow anyone to get too close. If it sees you—look out.” She didn’t laugh, exactly, but it was a kind of sarcastic reply I recognized.
“Good luck. I have to return.”
Alex shook her hand. She reached for mine, and part of me wanted to hug her for all the help she’d given us. Instead, I weakly shook her hand as I was torn between the two options.
“Thank you,” Wen said without a handshake.
Ford ran off. Her footfalls disappeared into the night in seconds.
“I guess we’ll have to get my dog another time,” Alex said with sadness.
I came to the conclusion that Alex’s intel mission had been successful on the one hand, but it left me with so many new questions I wasn’t really sure if we’d taken steps forward or back.
Chapter 3
“Okay, so now what do we do?” Wen’s whisper seemed dangerously loud in the quiet night air.
Ford had gotten us to the bridge, which stood twenty yards away. Strangely, the deck of the bridge was clear of debris from the traffic jam. Multiple lines of rectangular boxes blocked the near side, as it to prevent cars from using it. There was likely another blockage on the far side, but in the darkness, it was hard to make out.
“She said to stay behind the barrier,” I replied. “We have to get across.”
“Do we?” Wen shifted while crouching. We all had one flipped car between us and the approach to the end of the bridge. “These kids don’t really know for sure, do they? Maybe they want us to go over there and die.”
“No,” I said with an emphatic groan. “I didn’t get that feeling at all. They wanted to help us.”
I reached back and tapped the shotgun slung on my shoulder. “They gave us these.” When I pulled back my hand I rubbed against the bandage over the cut on my neck. I was surprised it didn't hurt as much as it did just a short time ago.
“Yeah, and if they have truckloads of them, maybe it was a small price to pay to get rid of us. We have to be smarter than them.”
“Alex?” I nudged him to get him into the exchange.
“Yeah. I think we have to cross, but I swear I see some dead people standing around over there.” He pointed directly across the canyon. The far side had a companion area of flat ground, though it wasn’t as wide. I also thought I saw hints of movement, like stars that twinkled when people walk
ed in front of their reflections on glass and steel.
“See. This is a trap.” Wen was very forceful. “I’m not going over there.”
“We can’t go back. We have to go that way.” I pointed to the bridge.
“We’re going across,” Alex flatly stated. “We stick together, stay low, and we deal with those things on the other side. We got lucky with those kids. I don’t think we’d have this chance if we’d found their parents first.”
Wen seemed desperate. “Alex, we can’t. I have a bad feeling just looking at it.”
On that, we agreed. Everything looked deadly under the ghostly moonlight. It could only be worse if the moon wasn’t out.
“I’m scared,” I admitted. “But I’d rather take my chances on the open bridge than go another minute in these crowded rows of cars. Without Ford to get us through, I feel we’ve pushed our luck to the limit, tonight.”
“Bái mù!” Wen said it but sounded surprised. “How did I remember Mandarin? I last called someone stupid—”
I had waited for many seconds before I realized she wasn’t going to figure it out.
Alex chose that instant to give practical advice. “We’ll run along this last row of cars until we reach those barriers. I think we can squeeze through on the side, but we may have to jump up and climb over.”
He turned to Wen. “Are you coming?”
She huffed. “Fine. I guess we do whatever she wants, huh?”
He laughed. “I thought we were doing what I wanted?”
I knew what he was doing, but I didn’t want an enemy.
“I’ll do what anybody wants, as long as we can get moving. I’m waiting for something to jump out at us from all these closed doors.” There were an infinite number of hiding places inside the wreckage. That worked both ways—good and bad—for us in the middle of the night. I hoped that would spur her to action.
Doing it your way, after all, huh?
I couldn’t deny I was relieved to have Alex on my side. I wondered for a second what things might look like if the pair of them had wanted to go a different way, and I was the one aiming for the bridge. Would I go off on my own? Unlikely. Wen probably made the same realization.
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