by Brom Kearne
21
Thorn had crammed himself into the corner of the cage as best he could to try and get some sleep. Sleep was, however, slow in coming, as he had too much on his mind. He was anticipating being given a chance at fighting for his freedom in the pit. Melina Bann was a very good fighter, but he liked having the chance of fighting her, or someone else in the gang, a lot more than he liked being stuck in this cage. If they wanted to kill him it would have been nothing for one of those gang members to jab a spear through the bars and end it all right now.
Thorn thought about those spears too. When Tom Marron and David Scontz, who seemed to occupy a higher status than the common gang members, had come for Len Dietrich, they were carrying guns. When the same two had led the ambush against Thorn they had both pulled guns. And yet, in all his time here in the camp, Thorn had never seen anyone else armed with a gun. None of the regular members had them, and yet according to Len Dietrich they had been stealing shipments of guns for the better part of a year. So where were they all? And if they weren’t being used to arm the gang, then what purpose were they to serve?
As he was struggling to get comfortable so sleep could take him, Thorn’s mind was asking these questions. He was reminded of something that Len Dietrich had said to him, which was that he didn’t trust the common citizen with that kind of weaponry. Allowing weapons to be in the hands of common people only empowered them, and he didn’t want them empowered. He wanted them loyal, and that meant restricting who was allowed to have a gun only to those who were most loyal to him. Thorn began to wonder if Court Raleigh followed the same line of thinking. If he did, that meant that he would have most of the guns safely stashed somewhere, and was only giving them out to those he trusted the most. The implications were that he couldn’t trust the common members of his own gang.
As these questions swirled in Thorn’s mind he entered into a light doze that was interrupted several minutes later by a light and timid tapping that managed to break through the dream barrier. Thorn had entered directly into REM sleep, and at first had great difficulty in resolving the struggle between his conscious mind and his autonomic need for sleep. Since he had been captured his body and his mind had been on constant alert. He would be able to sustain himself like this for a few days, but he could already feel the impending exhaustion creeping in. He could already feel the effects of the opiate wearing off, and the residual soreness and achiness of his body were beginning to take hold from around the periphery.
His conscious mind won the struggle and Thorn opened his eyes to scan his immediate environment. He found the moon-like face of a frightened boy staring at him through the bars. He was a sandy-haired kid with boyish freckles prominent across his nose and cheeks.
“Sandy?” Thorn asked.
“You’re the one from the farm, aren’t you? My father is the only person who’s ever called me that.”
Thorn sat up to get a better look at Scott Tanning’s face. There was enough light from the moon and the dying bonfires for him to see that Scott had been crying. Scott glanced over his shoulder at a noise from inside one of the tents and huddled closer to the cage, taking refuge in the shadows cast across it.
“Your father sent me to find you and deliver a message. He says that he loves you, and that he’s worried about you. He wants you to come home.”
Scott choked and fought to hold it back but he couldn’t. He began sobbing.
“Oh God I’ve been so stupid,” he said between choking sobs. “I’d give anything to go back. I didn’t know what I was getting into. I thought it was all fun, being rebellious and stupid. I thought that being part of a gang would be cool. I thought I’d finally found people who understood me and what I was going through. I thought I could be part of something bigger than myself. I didn’t know. Thorn, they murder people. You saw them. They killed that old man on the farm, like he was nothing. They force the new members to fight in that pit. You don’t know how many kids I’ve seen die in there, screaming and begging for mercy. I have cried every single time. I have to sneak away because if they catch me crying they beat me. They said I was weak, and they tease me about where my skull will go on the throne. You saw the throne, didn’t you? They make me carry the bodies into the desert and stake them out so they can be cleaned by the elements. I will never get those frozen dead faces out of my mind the rest of my life.”
He was becoming hysterical and Thorn didn’t know how to deal with it. Scott was making a lot of noise, and anyone in the nearby tents could have heard him easily, but Thorn couldn’t think of a single thing to say that might comfort him or make him stop. Emotional relations were never Thorn’s strong suit.
“Hey, ok, um, shh, quiet now,” Thorn said, flailing. He didn’t know if he should reach through the bars and pat Scott on the shoulder or not. He settled on not, and let the kid cry it out on his own.
“Why haven’t you tried to escape?” Thorn asked once Scott’s choking sobs had receded to the point that he could be heard over them.
“You can’t escape. We’re miles from any town. It’s just wilderness. A kid tried to escape once and they tracked him down. Court Raleigh chained the kid to the back of his bike and dragged him around the camp while they made everyone watch. He screamed nonstop for five laps. I’ll never get that sound out of my head. He was so mangled when we had to carry his body into the desert.” Scott swallowed hard as if he were fighting back another sobbing attack.
“I can get us out of here,” Thorn said quickly to head off the sobbing. Scott looked up at him skeptically. “But I’m going to need your help. Can you do that?”
“I don’t know,” Scott said.
“Listen to me; this is important. I think I might be able to pry the pins out of the door hinges, but I need a small, flat piece of metal, like a strip, or even a screwdriver. It has to be small enough that I can conceal it in my boot.”
Scott was shaking his head.
“No, don’t shake your head. I need your help if we’re going to get out of this. I also need to know where they’re keeping the weapons. The guns that they’ve stolen from the L & D shipments.”
“You saw what they did to that man.”
“And that’s what they’re going to do to us if you don’t help me.”
“I didn’t mean to run away. I didn’t mean to get into any of this. I wish I was back home.”
“Well you’re not back home and you’re never going to be if you don’t grow a pair and help me.”
The words came out much harsher than Thorn had intended. Scott recoiled and made as though he were going to run away.
“Wait, I need you to be strong,” Thorn said and reached through the cage to grab Scott’s arm, but he was too late. Scott back away, shaking his head, his frightened eyes unable even to meet Thorn’s. He was losing the battle with another sobbing attack.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered and scurried off like a frightened rabbit.
Thorn slammed his palm against the bars in frustration as he watched Scott Tanning disappear among the tents.
He settled back against the corner of the cage and tried to sleep, but sleep was even slower in coming than it was last time. Thorn’s mind was simply too active and filled with anticipation, and while he could rationally tell himself that he needed sleep, and that dwelling on things over which he had, at the moment, no control was a waste of time and effort, his mind rebelled. And the more energy he expended to attempt to quiet his mind, the further he drew from the blanket of sleep. It was late in the night before he finally was able to doze off, but his sleep was fitful, and when the sun broke over the ridge he didn’t feel as though he had rested at all.
The camp was buzzing with activity for most of the following day. Thorn could only assume that they were making preparations for Court’s revolution. Len Dietrich had wanted his army in place before the Browning Trade Caravan came through Webster Grove; Thorn postulated that Court Raleigh was following the same time-table. With nothing else to occupy his time Thorn nearly drove himself mad
with ‘what if’ scenarios. Melina Bann had joined the upper ranks of what Thorn had come to think of as the Black Guard, as they were the only gang members who wore all black. As she whisked by on some errand Thorn noticed that she had a sparker pistol tucked into her belt. He still did not see any guns on the regular gang members, somewhat confirming his earlier hypothesis. And the Black Guard treated the regular gang members as cruelly as the regular gang members treated the prospects.
Scott Tanning brought Thorn breakfast and lunch. He pushed the bowls through the bars without saying a word and without making eye contact before scurrying away again. Thorn realized that he wouldn’t be able to count on Scott’s help. Scott was simply too afraid. In animals as well as humans Thorn had observed that, when faced with threats to their existence, some fought, some attempted to flee, but most just froze. Scott was frozen. He bore the same expression that Thorn had seen on many of the faces in Collective City: that quiet acceptance of their fate and the relinquishment of responsibility for anything that happened to them. Court Raleigh was overseeing some very effective psychological conditioning here. The only way that Thorn would have a chance at breaking it would be to shatter the mystique that Court Raleigh had built around himself. He ruled the gang through fear, so if Thorn could show them that there was nothing to be afraid of, he might have a chance of turning some of them against the leadership, or at least, of getting some of them not to fight with the leadership when the time came.
That was, of course, assuming that most of the gang only followed Court Raleigh out of fear. If they, like Scott Tanning, had not known what it was they were getting into, then Thorn would have a chance. If, however, most of Court’s followers were like Melina: true believers in the cause, then there was nothing Thorn could do. But Thorn didn’t think this was the case. If they were true believers, why didn’t Court Raleigh trust them with his stolen weaponry? And why did they require the Black Guard to patrol the tent city to make sure they were doing their jobs, on threat of corporal punishment?
And the best way for Thorn to shatter Court Raleigh’s mystique would be to win his fight when he was brought to the pit this evening. Thorn was a fighter. He was looking forward to the opportunity.
The sun’s relentless blazing sapped Thorn’s strength and allowed him the sleep that his active mind had denied him the night before. He slept for several hours through the hottest part of the afternoon, and only awakened as the sun had nearly completed its course and was beginning to set behind the western ridge.
Thorn was feeling at least partially refreshed, despite his muscle soreness and the crick in his neck, when they came for him that evening. Melina stood outside of his cage, flanked by Tom Marron and David Scontz, each of them holding a sparker pistol in their hands.
“So if I win does this mean I get to be part of the gang?” Thorn asked as they bound his wrists and ankles. “Do I get one of those smart-looking tattoos?”
“You will not be permitted to join the gang,” Melina said. “You are to be offered up as a sacrifice to showcase our strength.”
“You mean I’m not going to get the chance to fight?”
Melina smirked. “Oh you’ll fight, all right.”
The bonfires and the torches were blazing as Thorn was led past them to the smaller black tent on the far side of the large one overlooking the fighting pit. The Amber Bones Gang had begun to gather, and those that saw Thorn amble by jeered at him. Melina pulled back the flap of the black tent and Thorn stopped dead still.
“What is this?” he demanded.
Melina shoved him inside.
It was a small tent, lit by electric lamplight, but it looked more like a torture chamber. A wooden frame was set in the middle of the space, with a hook from which Thorn’s wrists were hung. The hook was pulled until Thorn’s toes barely scraped the sandy floor. They passed his ankle chain through a similar hook in the floor to prevent him from being able to rear up and kick them.
Melina stood in front of Thorn with her hands clasped behind her back as Tom and David took up metal pipes that were leaning against the inner wall.
“What is this?” Thorn repeated.
Melina answered, “You didn’t really think that we would allow a fair fight, did you?”
“But what about all of Court Raleigh’s talk about strength and testing yourself?”
Melina laughed. The short barking sound was as humorless as her eyes. “That kind of talk is useful for motivating and controlling those people who need to be motivated and controlled. It will make for a motivating triumph when Tom Marron defeats and kills you tonight. You have been built up as a powerful fighter, a bounty hunter, someone who has looked death in the face many times and survived. And then you will be routed by one of Court Raleigh’s arms. It will make for some powerful motivation when we ask most of these gang members to lay down their lives in our fight against the Browning Trade Caravan tomorrow.”
“You’re fighting the trade caravan?”
Melina ignored the question, nodding to Tom and David who raised their pipes.
“Wait,” Thorn said quickly, “Len Dietrich, that’s why he could barely stand last night when he was brought out. You beat him before the fight, didn’t you? That man was no match for you on his best day and you had to beat him to secure a win? You’re even weaker than I thought. And the prospects? When they have to fight for a spot in the gang?”
“We choose which ones we think will make a good addition. Those that are deemed unworthy are brought in here and beaten before their fight so they can be easily defeated. We can’t leave something like this to chance. It’s too important.”
“But, surely, the victors notice something is wrong in their opponents? Surely they can’t go along with this?”
“They’re only too relieved to have won, and to have survived their crucible. They might notice something is off with their opponents, or they might attribute their easy victory to their own superiority. We have no desire to select the best fighters. In fact, usually those are the ones we pass over. We select those that we feel are the most easily manipulated, and the most easily controlled.”
“You’re a sham,” Thorn said through gritted teeth as he tried to pull himself up, testing the strength of the wooden frame from which he was hung. It was strong and didn’t budge in the slightest.
He was completely helpless as they shoved a gag into his mouth and began beating him with the pipes. They kept their blows to the stomach and chest: areas of the body that wouldn’t be visible when they dragged him out and threw him in the pit. Each blow fell with a burst of pain through Thorn’s core as David and Tom took turns swinging their pipes like they were chopping a tree. The whole time Melina watched with her hands clasped behind her back, a slight smile touching the corners of her lips.