The Dream Widow

by Stephen Colegrove

  BADGER WAITED IN A DARK TUNNEL half-blocked with piles of broken rock. Ancient, balled-up husks of spiders littered the floor along with the bones of an extremely dead rat.

  The screams from Robb made the wait harder, made Badger remember what Darius had done to her. Made her think this woman was taking her time, just like Darius.

  The soldiers called her “Consul Nahid” to her face and worse behind her back. If there weren’t at least two guards following her everywhere, Badger would have already given her a few undignified stab wounds and a slit throat.

  She had to be patient.

  The concrete wall sucked the heat from her body and Badger shivered. Mast shifted his feet as he crouched next to her. She elbowed the big lout before he tried to say something.

  A paste of charcoal and machine grease blackened their faces and hands, and soot dulled the blades of their hunting knives.

  Eventually the screams stopped.

  Badger heard a door open and peered around a dark corner. Fifteen meters away, a square opening shone with light. The Consul and her two guards passed by.

  Badger touched Mast’s shoulder and crawled around the corner, careful not to disturb any of the broken concrete or loose stone.

  Both stopped at the opening, where the abandoned corridor met the lighted hallway of Station. After a long wait Badger heard a rustle of cloth.

  She held her braids and tilted her head out near the floor.

  Fifteen meters away a Circle soldier sat on a chair near one of the doors. He had leaned back, two legs of his chair off the ground, and stared with drooping eyes at the opposite wall of the corridor.

  Badger pulled a short knife from her belt. She slowly stood up, took a deep breath, and flicked it through the air.

  The soldier looked to his right as it flew past his face and bounced noisily down the corridor. He stared at the knife on the concrete, then heard a patter of feet from behind. Only meters away, two black-faced demons were sprinting toward him. He grabbed the carbine resting on his lap.

  Badger tackled the soldier as he tried to stand up, and the carbine fell on the corridor floor with a clatter. She pulled her knife from his gurgling neck and stabbed again.

  As Mast grabbed the carbine and searched the pockets of the still-twitching body, Badger slid open the door with one hand. She ground her teeth and looked away from the sight in the center of the room.

  A wooden post ran from ceiling to floor, measured exactly and hammered sideways into the space by the looks of it. Two horizontal beams had been nailed to the back of the post. Robb’s arms and legs were spread in an ‘X’ and tied to the ends of the beams. Hundreds of superficial cuts and pinpoints of dried blood covered his body. Long needles as thin as a cat’s whisker stuck from his chest and bobbed up and down as he breathed. Matted red hair and sweat covered Robb’s drained, emotionless face.

  Badger stepped into the room. She began to cut the ropes with her hunting knife and his eyes opened wide.

  “Kira?”

  She covered his mouth with one hand and shook her head.

  Mast came into the room and stuffed everything that looked useful into a bag: blankets, clothes, a leather roll and a yellow book lying on the table.

  Badger sawed through the last rope and caught Robb before he collapsed to the filth-covered floor.

  “The needles,” he whispered.

  She pulled hair-thin rods from his ribs, chest, and back of his legs. Robb moved his arms freely but couldn’t stand without Badger’s help.

  “I’ll take him,” said Mast.

  He handed the carbine and the bag full of scavenged items to Badger and carried Robb back to the abandoned tunnel. Back in the darkness, Badger kept a hand on the wall to guide herself.

  After sprinting for a few minutes through the maze of tunnels they stopped to rest. Mast lowered Robb to the cracked floor.

  “I can walk now. You don’t have to carry me.”

  “Good to hear.”

  He watched the red-haired teenager gulp down a flask of water, and helped him wear a ragged shirt and trousers.

  Badger took a metal tube from her pocket. She sprinkled half the contents in the tunnel behind them and the air filled with a sharp, pungent odor. As they continued walking, Badger continued to drip the rest of the liquid along the path. She was careful not to let it touch her clothing or hands, and dropped the empty vial into a pocket.

  Robb coughed and tried to muffle it with his hands. “Where are we going?”

  “Somewhere safe,” whispered Mast.

  The muscular teenager led them through the maze of black tunnels, at times consulting symbols scratched on the walls and a cloth map in his pocket.

  They walked through a room of dusty chairs and squeezed sideways through a sharp fissure in the back wall. Broken ceiling tiles and fallen rock filled the next room, but Mast headed for a narrow hole in the floor. He dropped through first and caught each of them as they dangled legs into the level below.

  Mast led Badger and Robb deeper and deeper into the earth through endless broken walls and dusty stairwells. When they came to a corridor with an unbroken floor and smooth walls Mast held their hands and pushed each to run hard.

  The corridor ended in a metal hatch and Mast knocked three times. Crimson light streamed into the hallway as the door swung open. Two women lowered the barrels of their rifles.

  “Good to see you back,” said the younger one.

  Mast touched his chest and bowed. “Glad to be back, ladies.”

  Both he and Badger cleaned the black paste from their hands and face at a washbasin. They traveled through a short section of crimson-lit corridor and greeted another female guard. As Mast opened the next hatch the air filled with light and the noise of playing children.

  Robb peered through his fingers. “What is this place?”

  “The Tombs,” said Mast.

  The corridor was lined with open doorways, and on either side were groups of toddlers drawing on paper with makeshift, cloth-wrapped pencils or listening to a female teacher. In other rooms older children sewed patchwork quilts and clothing from rags.

  The light changed to turquoise as Badger opened a hatch to the main cavern. Reed’s dome still sparkled, the last link in the circle of five dead controller beds.

  “What in the three, flipping––”

  Robb stumbled over the hatch frame and Badger caught him.

  Wilson lay on a bed next to Reed’s glass dome, the silver band still around his forehead. A white mask covered his nose and mouth and a tube connected it to a squat cylinder on the floor. Two bags of clear liquid dangled from masts that sprouted from the cylinder, and dripped clear liquid into bandages at both of Wilson’s elbows. Red and black wires covered his body and plugged into holes on the cylinder.

  Robb walked closer. “What happened to him?”

  “HE happened to him,” said Badger.

  She leaned over Wilson for a moment, and kissed his cheek.

  Mast, Robb, and Badger followed a fat yellow cable that snaked along the floor to the open door of the medical center.

  Inside, a tall blonde girl stood beside a treatment bed and a bandaged and blanket-covered man. She looked up from a display screen in her hands.

  “Robb! Glad to see you made it,” said Janna.

  “Thanks,” said Robb. “Is that Martinez?”

  Janna looked down at the screen. “Yeah. He was shot in the first battle.”

  “He looks so gray.”

  “Don’t worry, he’ll be fine. We’ve had to put a few of the wounded into these recovery comas.”

  Badger smacked an empty treatment bed. “Over here.”

  She helped Robb onto the bed while Mast dumped the bag of stolen gear at a nearby table. Janna began to slap discs and wires to Robb’s body.

  “Congratulations, kid,” said Badger.

  “What for?”

  Badger leaned forward. “Everyone thought you were dead. That’s twice for you.”

  Ro
bb looked away. He suddenly covered his face and began crying.

  A happy scream came from across the room and Mina limped toward them on long metal crutches. She wore a patched-together yellow dress and her strawberry-blonde hair had been tied back with a white ribbon.

  “You found him!”

  “Yes, dear,” said Mast.

  Mina gave Robb a hug. “Welcome back.”

  “Thanks, Mina. How are you feeling?”

  She glanced down at the ends of the crutches, and her single leg. “It’s not worth talking about. At least I’m alive.”

  Mast held out his arms to her. “How about me?”

  “You too!”

  Mina kissed Mast and squeezed him around the waist. Badger rolled her eyes.

  “That’s better,” said Mast. “Dear, can you find some clothes for Robb?”

  “Of course! I will bring them,” said Mina and she limped away.

  Robb sniffed and wiped his nose. “What really happened to Wilson?”

  “Reed wouldn’t talk to us so he put that silver thing on his head,” said Badger. “He’s been like that ever since.”

  “The battle––how did it fall apart so fast?”

  “Tran and his brother, maybe even others, set the blockhouse on fire. They gave tea with a sleeping drug to just about all the tribals.”

  “The Circle had to give him that stuff when he was captured,” said Mast. He pulled out the magazine of the carbine and checked the rounds.

  Robb covered his eyes. “I swear he never said anything.”

  “We know. It’s not like he’d tell you he’d just made a secret pact with the Circle,” said Badger.

  Janna cleaned the side of Robb’s face with a damp cloth.

  “I knew some of you were still alive,” he said. “But I wondered if you would ever find me.”

  “I’ve been stealing supplies from Office and Barracks for a week,” said Badger. “That woman called Consul Nahid mentioned your name this morning.”

  Robb winced and closed his eyes at her name.

  “It’s only been a week?”

  Mast opened a pouch and carbine rounds clattered on the table. “Eight days.”

  “Robb, I’m sorry,” said Badger. “If I’d known where they had you–”

  He chopped his hand down. “Go back for Kaya.”

  “She’s alive?”

  “I heard things from the guards, when they talked to each other.”

  Mast set down the carbine and looked at Robb. “Keep going.”

  “Kaya is one of the ‘protected,’” said Robb. “Some of the women wear a red bandana around the neck––that means no one can touch them. I heard the guards complaining about that and using her name.”

  “Why are some of the women protected, and not others?” asked Badger.

  Robb shook his head.

  “What happens to the ones that aren’t?”

  “That I know. Every two days they hold a lottery. The assigned numbers of the unprotected women are marked on wooden chips. Each soldier draws a chip from the bowl and can spend time with her until the first bell of the night watch. Some trade and barter to get the name they want. Others play gambling games with the chips. It’s all the guards talk about. A few of the soldiers are good men––I know because the others make fun of them––but most are evil, stupid beasts.”

  Badger spit on the ground. “Organized rape.”

  “That could be, although I heard about soldiers who forced themselves on women. Darius punished them horribly, at least that was the rumor. It seems like the whole stupid lottery is a system the soldiers know about, and have done before.”

  “Maybe it’s a kind of forced dating. You know, a way to mash together different tribes,” said Mast.

  “I don’t care if it’s the second coming,” said Badger. “I’m still slicing the filthy worms to pieces.”

  Mast held up his hand. “One thing at a time. When Carter and Zhang get back from their supply run we’ll make a plan to find Kaya.”

  “The Circle army is weak and disorganized,” said Robb. “All you need is a dozen men.”

  “We don’t have a dozen,” said Mast.

  “What?”

  “Counting you, we have five who can fight. Plus one hundred eight-nine women, children, and wounded.”

  Badger held the edge of her soot-blackened knife up to the light. “And one very, very angry girl.”

  THE CAFETERIA HAD BEEN CLEARED of everything apart from two chairs and a table covered in red cloth. A line of soldiers packed the corridor outside.

  The men stopped talking and pressed flat against the walls as Consul Nahid and Darius passed through to the cafeteria. The Consul wore her usual tight-fitted, black leather jacket and trousers, and Darius had on a simple olive-green jumpsuit.

  Four guards with black carbines slung over their shoulders followed them and stood to either side of the table. Their goggled, black-masked faces watched Darius and the Consul sit behind it.

  “I still don’t see where the boy went,” she said.

  “Your concern is understandable––” Darius caught the eye of a soldier in a red cap and raised his hand. “––but how far can the boy run? We’ll catch him when he tries to steal food.”

  The soldier approached the table and bowed. “Would Consul Nahid and Senator Darius like to begin the session?”

  Darius nodded. He took an ornate silver disc from his pocket and banged the edge on the table three times. “Two-day has ended. The new two-day is now in session.”

  Three men tattooed as soldiers and in rumpled uniforms trailed into the room behind an armed guard. Tight ropes secured their wrists behind them. Their heads had been shaved recently, exposing numerical tattoos on the right side of their skulls.

  The soldier in the red cap waved his hand to the floor and the three prisoners knelt.

  “I present the accused to Your Graces,” he said. “In two separate attacks yesterday, all three men dishonored a protected female and assaulted another tribal woman without good reason.”

  “Do any speak in their defense?”

  “None do. The men ask for mercy and accept the punishment of Your Graces.”

  “As they should,” said Darius. “By attacking a member of our new allies, they’ve attacked all of us. By touching a protected female they break the social contract and create hatred in the families of these women. We’ll be spending the winter here and need these husbands and fathers to continue to hunt for food, clear the tunnels, and tend the gardens. I will not allow the safety of this army to be compromised.”

  Darius unfolded a black cap from his pocket and pushed it down to his ears.

  “By the authority of Consul Arian Nahid, I declare ten lashes for each and a night spent on the stake.”

  The guard and four prisoners filed out.

  The Consul drummed her fingers on the table. “Ten is low, very low.”

  “We have three dozen effective fighters,” said Darius. “Anyone who can hold a gun is needed.”

  He judged a few more infractions and gave minor punishments. Murmurs filled the hallway outside and a white-jacketed soldier hurried into the cafeteria with a huge wooden bowl in his arms. With each step something clattered inside the bowl like rain on a metal bucket.

  The white-jacketed soldier placed the bowl in front of the Consul and bowed away. Round wooden chips with numbers burned into the faces were piled inside.

  “Today the order will be reversed,” yelled the red-capped soldier at the doorway. He read from a list. “Wesslyn! Vargos!”

  Two soldiers in mottled brown and green pushed into the cafeteria and drew chips. The face of one fell as he saw the number he’d drawn. The other was ecstatic.

  Darius and the consul stayed only for the first few drawings, then left the cafeteria and headed through the underground tunnels. Four masked guards followed close behind.

  The Consul stared at her feet as they walked. “I’ve been wondering why your dogs haven’t caught a
ny of the savage little ‘rabbits.’”

  “The dogs we have are magnificent, Your Grace, but they’re more like short ponies than hunting animals,” said Darius. “Sadly, they’re too large for many of the crevices underground. The ‘rabbits’ also use some kind of chemical that sickens the dogs tracking them.”

  The six passed through a warm cavern filled with small citrus trees in wooden planters. Boards had been hammered into large rectangular frames and filled with black earth. Green sprouts covered the beds and had begun to unfold tiny leaves. Blue-tinted light streamed from panels in the low ceiling.

  Darius waved at the gardens. “Isn’t this amazing? Without the knowledge of the surviving villagers I doubt we’d have any of this. Or without the tribal labor, able to do it.”

  “About the tracking,” said the Consul. “You said the old machines know the location of everyone at all times. How are they stealing supplies, then? Or stealing a boy?”

  “The screens track the original villagers who have the implants, but they don’t work well if the person you want to track is underground like the demon girl and Wilson. Outside, even on the mountain, it’s excellent.”

  The group entered a dim tunnel at the far end of the gardens.

  “Tell me what we do if your plans fail,” she said.

  Darius spread his hands. “Your Grace! Have I failed yet? Was I wrong about this valley?”

  The Consul smiled and shook her head. “I’ve never seen such amazing machines, such fantastic devices. It’s like stepping three hundred years into the past. I smell and taste the old days in everything here.”

  “Wilson and the hundreds underground will starve or be captured and when the snows melt in the spring I’ll escort you to Albu City,” said Darius. “Only a few of the tiny machines we’ve cut from the arms of these villagers will make you richer than a thousand queens.”

  “Don’t speak in hyperbole, it makes you sound desperate. Of course those riches will be shared with you. I’m more concerned about a future where the snows have thawed but this village still isn’t under complete control.”

  “If that’s still the case in the spring, I’ll come back with experts and specialized explosives,” said Darius mournfully. “I’d rather capture the two of them alive, though.”