Third Wave: Bones of Eden

by Zaide Bishop

  He swallowed. She stared back at him, eyes too small for her face and lost in the fat flab of her jowls. She had no tumors, he realized. Neither had her piglet, the one they had butchered and eaten.

  Sugar had killed and eaten animals all his life and wild boar by the hundreds. He had done so with respect and efficiency. He had never imagined it was something that would have...consequences. Not like this.

  Pigstix didn’t look at him with fear. There was no trace of the animal needs—fight, flee, fuck, feed. There was a cold calculation there. Thoughts, ideas, emotions. It hadn’t been enough for the people before to make disease-free babies in Eden. This was a person in a pig body, a hybrid for harvest, a vat for organs that had been tweaked and twisted until it knew what it was. Until it could think “I am.”

  “I am mad.”

  “I want revenge.”

  “I want justice.”

  She grunted, and more of the sounder emerged. Two more giant sows and three boars—tattooed and full-grown. But there were more skulking in the background. Two—and three-year-olds, untattooed. And probably somewhere not far from here would be the remaining piglets. Siblings of the one he, Charlie, Tango and Xícara had naively gutted, cooked and consumed.

  “We didn’t know any better,” he whispered.

  She made an ugly, threatening sound, raspy and full of hate. She took one heavy step toward him, but there was nowhere he could go. He couldn’t outrun them in bare feet. They were all around him. They were going to rip him limb from limb.

  He saw the flaming arrow arcing up, and one of the boars squealed a warning, but Pigstix was too slow to step aside. She was still twisting to look when it embedded in her rump, still flaming, and her scream tore into Sugar’s skull.

  She dropped and rolled, but the flames didn’t extinguish. The cars’ insides had shattered and cracked being tossed around in the wave, and she chanced to roll in a small pool of gasoline. The mud on her hide bloomed into flame, and she bucked like a pony, lumbering toward cover emitting deafening, pained squeals. The gasoline on the ground flared to life too, and the flames licked back to the source. There was a whumpf, a huge pop, then the rest of the pigs bolted. Sugar fell back on his ass—stunned, but unhurt.

  Fox slid between the cars, moving at a swift jog. Strapped to his back, Raven began to cry, startled by the explosion. Flames licked around the car, turning the night hazy orange, but they didn’t spread far.

  “Sugar!” Fox pulled him to his feet without checking he was okay. “Come on. Why don’t you have shoes?”

  “I was... Charlie.”

  “You’re going to end up with no feet. Come on, before they come back.”

  “Have you seen any of the others?”

  “Some. You’re going the wrong way.” Fox dragged him a few paces, but Sugar resisted.

  “Charlie might be this way.”

  “Charlie might be anywhere. You need shoes. Fire. Weapons. Stop being an idiot. You think I don’t want to find Whiskey?”

  The pigs, the explosion. Sugar was still disorientated. He gave in, letting Fox guide him back the way he had come.

  He was no good to Charlie dead.

  * * *

  There was no earth, no sky, no time or self-awareness, only pain. A whole universe of pain, galaxies and stars, plains of empty space, black holes and throbbing raw heat. Each time awareness was born, it was aborted, forced back into the well of darkness because the light of reality was much, much too bright.

  Zebra tried to sit up, then really wished he hadn’t. He was buried deep in branches and leaves. Through them, just barely, he could see white sky. There was a smell, a deep seeping smell of the ocean. Dead fish and dredge. Under him, water gurgled. One of his feet dangled in a pool of some kind. There was a branch stuck all the way through his left arm. The skin around it was swollen, red and weeping. He suspected it was not the only thing he was impaled on.

  He croaked. It wasn’t a word, but it was a sound. An animal sound. One that would attract predators, not assistance. It might be better to be silent.

  He tested the unimpaled arm to see if that was, in fact, an accurate description. It moved easily enough, though his shoulder was stiff and swollen. He wormed his right arm through the branches to grasp the one sticking through his skin.

  The crack of wood felt like splintering bone, and he screamed—a horrible, miserable half-human sound. But the branch was broken, and he was able to simply slide his arm off it.

  He lay back, panting and desperate, then slowly moved his legs, testing their encumbrance before finding footholds and pushing himself toward the light.

  He slithered down the cutting branches and debris into a pool of fetid water some three feet deep, full of rubbish and, by the feel of it, teeth and broken glass. He was in a drain of some sort. A grill had caught flotsam and created a massive dam. He must have been deposited somewhere near the top before he lost consciousness, or he would have drowned.

  He tried to feel lucky, but it was more struggle than it was worth.

  He crawled, infantile, up the side of the drain and collapsed at the top into a world of mud, salt and dead fish. He’d never seen so many palm leaves. Who knew there were that many palm trees in the world?

  He staggered unsteadily to his feet.

  “I will kill you if you move.”

  He froze, then slowly turned. Whiskey was standing on the far side of the drain, makeshift spear in hand. She looked at him impassively, and he swallowed back a sudden lump in his throat. She hadn’t been the same since she’d been tied up by the scientists. Something inside her had broken. Gone wrong, somehow. Or maybe she was never right to begin with. Either way, right now she scared him more than she had all those years before the Varekai and Elikai had become just “Kai.”

  “It’s me,” he said quietly, voice raw. “It’s Zebra.”

  She slid down the drain, picked her way neatly through the water and scrambled up the far side. There was no recognition, no apology. He skittered away from her.

  “Are you badly hurt?” she asked.

  Warily, he showed her his arm, then snatched it back as she prodded it.

  “Ouch!”

  “You’ve got a wound on the back of your leg too.”

  He looked, and an irritating throbbing took on new meaning as he saw the filthy gash in his thigh.

  “Come on,” she said, and started walking.

  He hesitated. “Wait. Where are the others?”

  “This way.”

  “Are you sure?” He limped after her. Did he have a choice?

  “Reasonably.”

  “How?”

  “Mother’s intuition.” She leaned over, picking up a sturdy-looking branch and handing it to him to use as a cane.

  He accepted. “By ‘others’ you mean...? Oh. You mean Raven and Fox?”

  “I saw Fox scale a building with Raven. They will be waiting. We will find more Kai on the way.”

  “We have to go east.” He paused. “I mean, if I get septic and die, you have to take the tribe east. There’s a two-mile river. I don’t know if it’s two miles long or wide, but that’s what it is. Go inland from there, and you’ll find Fifteen and her people. She said we’ll be safe there. Maybe.”

  Whiskey glanced at him. “I don’t need to know that. You’ll be there with me.”

  “I just...you know.” He shrugged, then regretted it. “If I slow you down. If you have to leave me.”

  “I won’t,” she promised.

  The pain in his leg was getting too bad for talking, so they simply walked.

  * * *

  Charlie woke to the oddest sensation. A pulling, sucking tug across her chest. She opened her eyes and saw the round, bald head of an infant, suckling at her breast. She was still marred with gore, dried brown no
w in the early morning sun, and covered in flies that had been drawn by the placenta and dead rat. But she was alive, feeding and, from Charlie’s less than favorable vantage point, all in one piece.

  Charlie sat slowly, holding the baby against her, sending up a whole swarm of insects. Her own body was almost entirely purple with bruises, and there was a frightening flap of skin hanging off her hip revealing raw tissue below. Her baby was unharmed. A little too small. A little too pink. But unharmed.

  She looked up into the clear morning sky, then across the ruined, filthy remains of the city below her. Where were her people? Her sisters? Sugar?

  She couldn’t venture into that mire. She needed supplies—food, clean water, protection. She got painfully to her feet, cradling her daughter in her arms.

  East, Zebra had said. East to the two-mile river.

  She limped toward the sun.

  * * *

  Whiskey had failed. She had sworn to herself she would protect her people, but she would not be bringing all of them home again. How was she supposed to protect them from earthquakes and tsunamis? Now all she could do was gather those who remained and do what she had to to get them to safety.

  Her breasts ached. Somewhere, Raven was hungry. Fox was a good father. The best father, since he was the only one, but she supposed that reasoning also made him the worst. Either way, he could do everything for Raven but feed her.

  She glanced back at Zebra. Under the mud, he was alarmingly pale, but they had too far to go for her to start carrying him yet. If he collapsed, she would drag him, but it would be easier for both of them if he stayed on his feet.

  “What is that?” he asked, momentarily so lost in wonder he seemed to have forgotten his pain.

  She turned and took stock of the creature that had come into view through the piles of debris. Vast and dead, shimmering silver in the midday sun.

  She frowned. “I think it’s a fish.”

  “Can fish get that big? Could it be a submarine?”

  Whiskey ventured closer to the shimmering flank. No, the smell betrayed it. It towered over her, sagging in the sun. She picked her way to its head and found a jelly eye as wide across as her arm was long. Its teeth, looking tiny and needlelike in its mouth, were the same length as her fingers, but half as thick.

  Zebra gave a low whistle. “Do you think we can eat it?”

  “Better not. The bigger the fish is, the more likely it’s gathered heavy metals.”

  “If I’d known that was in the ocean, I might not have been so keen to swim.”

  “The ocean is not our problem right now. There are plenty of predators on land.”

  He snorted. “And plenty of carrion for them to feed on.”

  “Perhaps. Do you smell that?”

  “Dead fish?”

  “Smoke.”

  “Are you sure? Because this two tons of dead fish smells like—”

  She put her hand over his mouth. “Every time you speak, I wish you were mute.”

  She let him go, and he looked chagrined, but only for a moment; then he brightened. “Hey. I do smell smoke!”

  He cupped his hands to his mouth, drew a deep breath and hollered: “Coooooeeeee!”

  “Zebra!” she snapped. “Predators.”

  He started to reply, but there came a faint reply: “Oooooohweee!” He whooped with joy. “It’s them! It’s our brothers!”

  “Don’t hurt yourself,” she said, as he began to struggle through the muck toward the sound. It would be just like him to fall into an open drain and cause them even more problems.

  A small cluster of Kai had gathered on the third story of a building. Looking it over, Whiskey wasn’t sure if she trusted it not to collapse, but they had a fire going up there and a meager gathering of supplies.

  India and Tare were there, Sugar too, and Maria, Delta and Foxtrot. Whiskey barely noticed them. They might not have existed, because Fox and Raven were there too. She ran to Fox, and he gathered her against him, Raven crushed between them. The baby squawked in protest, but Whiskey didn’t care. Fox knitted his fingers into her hair, pulling her close. She could smell the sweat on him, and even under the rancid filth it was reassuring. They kissed fiercely, his fingers hurting where they tugged on her scalp. No pain had ever been so sweet.

  He pulled back to study her, then offered up Raven. “She’s hungry.”

  “She’s not the only one,” Whiskey muttered, but she took her daughter in her arms, kissing her forehead and moving her into place to feed. The baby was unharmed but for the cut on her arm from the earthquake. The wound was clean and scabbed. No sign of redness. Fox had some minor bruises, but Whiskey was reasonably certain those, too, were from the earthquake. Not everyone had fared so well.

  “Have you seen Charlie?” Sugar asked.

  “If I had, she would be with me,” Whiskey said. “I only found this idiot. But when Raven is fed, I will go looking again. If any of our kin are alive, I will find them. You need to gather the supplies to care for them.”

  “Not here,” India said. “We need to move inland, higher, where there’s not so much filth and salt.”

  “We’re not leaving yet!” Sugar snapped. “Not until we’ve found everyone.”

  Whiskey glanced at him. “We are not going to find everyone.” It hurt her to say the words, but she didn’t let it show. “Not everyone survived, Sugar. You have to accept that now, so you don’t kill those who have.”

  He glared, radiating undue hostility. “Don’t forget who’s in charge here, Whiskey.”

  Fox snorted. “If you want to lead, Sugar, we need to have a tribe.”

  Sugar watched Whiskey and Fox slink away through the debris. They had left Raven with India and Tare, and Tare was taking the babysitting as an opportunity to nap, with the baby sleeping comfortably on his chest.

  India moved back and forth between the injured Kai, using what supplies they had to dress their injuries. She’d been boiling rags for an hour and was now using them to clean and bind lacerations, but they had nothing with which to sew up the wounds and no herbs to act as antibiotics or disinfectant.

  Sugar saw all these things, but could not bring himself to care. Charlie was missing. Her absence swallowed all rationality. His chest ached far worse than the cuts and scrapes he had accumulated in the tsunami. He could barely breathe, and every moment he did nothing was an eternity.

  He stood up, picking up one of the crude staffs Delta had gathered.

  “What are you doing?” India asked.

  “Looking for her.”

  “We need you here,” she said firmly. “Like you said, you’re in charge. You need to be here to make decisions.”

  “She needs me more.”

  He stopped to tie rope around his feet, coiling it around and around like a bandage. There was too much sharp debris here to walk barefoot, but materials for shoes were in short supply.

  “Stay here,” he told India. “I’ll come back when I’ve found her, then we’ll move to higher, safer ground.”

  She frowned. He could see she disagreed, but it didn’t matter. None of it mattered but Charlie.

  “You shouldn’t go out there alone.” Maria stood up. “I’ll come.”

  “No, you need to be here. I’ll be back soon, I promise.”

  He made his way down the stairs and back out onto the street. He was not properly armed. The pigs could find him again. The sun was high, baking the slurry and dead sea life. The air was starting to grow thick with flies and other insects. He was hungry. They needed freshwater.

  Would they have been better or worse right now if they had stayed in the archipelago? The tsunami wouldn’t have reached the higher parts of Pinnacle Island, but he had little doubt everything else was gone. The smaller islands would be devastated, stripped of life, the freshwat
er would be polluted. But no one would have died. Charlie would be beside him.

  It was impossible to make the right choice. Sometimes all your choices were wrong.

  He hiked away into the devastation.

  Chapter Four

  The sun had started its descent before Sugar reached the hillside. He had seen no other Kai but had found the corpses of a great many things. Megalania, dogs, goats, a black-and-white horse, an albatross with a nine-foot wingspan and an albino gorilla.

  The death and black muck seemed to go on forever, as if there was no place left in the world that hadn’t been touched by the devastation. Then, halfway up the hill it simply...stopped. Here was the salty mud and filth, then there was healthy green grass, dandelions, a park bench and rows of weathered, sagging houses and overgrown gardens.

  There was a pile of sodden bloody tissue on the road. Riddled with flies and maggots, with a long twisting purple cord. Bloody Kai footprints led away from it on the dusty sidewalk. Just three of them, before the blood had dried and faded away.

  Sugar crouched beside the gore, ignoring the buzzing cloud of insects that rose around him. This was afterbirth. He hadn’t seen human afterbirth before, because he had been on the mainland with Charlie when Whiskey had given birth, but he had seen dog, goat and pig.

  Charlie had gone into labor here. She’d walked away and taken the child with her. His child. She was still alive.

  “Charlie!” he called, cupping his hands to his mouth. “Charlie! Cooeee! Cooeee!”

  He cocked his head, but there was only silence.

  She was gone.

  * * *

  Slowly, what remained of the tribe came together. Tango and Xícara had sheltered high in a sagging building, but the entrance had collapsed after the remains of a bus slammed against the front doors.

  Even after they had smashed a second-story window, it had taken assistance from Whiskey and Fox before they were able to make their way onto the branches of a tree and scramble down to join their kin.