Prophet of the Badlands (The Awakened Book 1)

by Matthew S. Cox

  It was dark. She knew from the lack of color. Twenty or so feet away, Zhar sat cross-legged on the ground in her new grey-on-white camouflage pants and combat boots. Zhar deferred one of the camo shirts to Ramani, who seemed as uncomfortable at exposure as Rachel, and took it without caring about the blood. The garment fit the slender woman like a dress, covering her down to her knees.

  Rachel had taken the full set, shirt, pants, and boots. She gave that man’s “skivvies,” as she called them, to Aya; a black tank top and boxer briefs, which they had to practically force onto her. The girl had felt she would be treated better if she “behaved,” and by that she meant staying nude. She was out of her element now, no longer anyone’s property, and desperately trying to attach herself to Zhar. The redhead was having none of it, wanting no dead weight, and insisting Aya learn to pull her share.

  Covered in camo, authority wafted from Rachel, and she had collected all of the men’s possessions and sorted through them for what was useful. It was amusing listening to her complain about the horrible shape the rifles were in. One look at them and she had demanded to know what year it was, but none of them knew.

  Althea sank out of sight before her glowing eyes attracted notice. She buried her face between her knees and hugged her legs. A cool breeze filtered in through the shards of a distant broken window, threading about her limbs and chasing away the torpid air of the room. She was supposed to be asleep, but all she could think about was how much she missed Den. Rachel had shown a side that frightened her as well. For a fleeting moment, it seemed Rachel valued life, but she was just like everyone else out here. Tears worked their way over her cheek and down her shins as she thought about Zhar’s words. Would people always own her? Was it okay to be bad to bad people?

  Vakkar’s face hovered in the murk of her thoughts. She pondered how she had manipulated him to spare Rachel the pain of being wifed. Could she have done the same thing back in the seed room? If she had, she would still be with Den now. Crying harder, she felt as stupid and weak as Zhar said she was.

  So that was what “pathetic” meant.

  Sniffling back tears, she accepted if she had done it, these women would still be Vakkar’s property. Good had come of her losing Den. Was it pathetic to tolerate his loss for their benefit?

  “I know where we are now. We can get there if we follow path forty to the setting sun and turn north on path eighty-four to twenty-five,” said Zhar. “Once we get the kid there, we’ll be set. No raider can get in.”

  “She has a home.” Rachel interrupted in a whisper undoubtedly intended to let Althea sleep. “And a crush on a boy.”

  Aya and Ramani made the kind of noises some women do at seeing something cute.

  Zhar sounded unimpressed. “She’s not even twelve yet, blonde, and pretty. She’ll have a different one next week.”

  Althea let go of her legs and dug her fingers into the cushion, fighting the urge to yell. Squinting with anger, she lay down and crawled to the edge of the seat to listen.

  They prattled for a while about their first boyfriends, save Aya who bathed in awkward silence. Rachel’s tales of her life sounded far beyond anything Althea could envision. High school, dating, dances, something called a prom, none of which made any sense at all, and boredom threatened to carry her back to sleep.

  “You will treat her like a person?” Ramani’s timid whisper broke a pause in their levity. “I do not think it right to make a slave of the Prophet after she has helped us escape being slaves.”

  “No. She will be treated well. She is a child still, we must keep her safe in the mine.”

  “Mine?” Rachel asked.

  “Yes,” said Zhar. “My home is built in the depths of an old mine, we have a big metal wall in front of the tunnel. No raiders can get us. We will take the Prophet back and Finlay will eat his words.”

  There was Zhar’s motive. Althea scowled. Once more, she was someone’s prize to trade for glory. Even if this place would treat her well, she would be hidden away underground while so many other people needed help.

  “We should ask her,” Rachel said, scraping at the guts of the rifle. “For fuck’s sake, when was the last time this thing got cleaned? Sergeant Michaels would have PT’d the shit out of this guy.”

  “A mother does not ask child’s opinion on bedtime.” Zhar gestured at the ceiling. “She is too young to make those decisions. I will do what is best for her.”

  “You want a captive princess,” Ramani muttered. “Treat her like royal, but she cannot leave.”

  Zhar’s whisper picked up a command tone. “So? It’s the same anywhere for her. Better captive and princess than captive and caged.”

  “I… Yes.” Ramani gave up.

  Rachel sounded hesitant. “What if she doesn’t want to go? It seems she has a home already.”

  “What good does it do her to return to such a weak place? Raiders took her once. They will take her again. She follows us there. If she asks, we say we can help her find her little boyfriend, but she will soon feel she is home. When the Prophet is at Shy Ann, we will be powerful.”

  “Shy Ann? Who the hell is that?” Rachel paused, a look of horror in her eyes. “Wait, do you mean Cheyenne? What does your mine look like?”

  “It is a big hole in the mountain with a city inside.”

  Althea could imagine Zhar holding her arms way out.

  Rachel seemed despondent. “Fuck… Dammit.”

  “What is wrong?” Aya broke her silence.

  “Cheyenne Mountain used to be a military installation, but if it has become a survivor town…” Her voice trailed off, before finding renewed determination. “No, I don’t believe it. There’s gotta be something left of civilization. The whole world can’t be lost to this madness.”

  Althea scooted back on the seat at the sound of a chair scraping the floor. She folded her hands under her cheek and pretended to be asleep as the scuffing of boots draw closer. She felt Zhar’s emotions nearby as well as a hand on her shoulder, groping about in the pitch dark to make sure she was still there. The hand departed after a gentle pat on the head.

  “Sleep well, kiddo.” Zhar’s warm whisper fell across her face. “In a few days you’ll be safe.”

  Quiet she remained. Dread of being taken again, even by these women, held sleep off with ease. Zhar had said people would own her until she stood up for herself; tonight she would take a stand and seek her own destiny. As the boots scuffed away, she opened her eyes and listened to everything.

  When at last the sound of their conversations drifted off through the blur of approaching sleep and gave way to silence, she peered over the seat. Aya and Ramani lay against each other in a booth while Zhar draped herself over a pile of seat cushions gathered on the floor near the entrance. Rachel slept under a table against the wall, surrounded by an arc of empty glass bottles.

  Althea slid off the seat and crept to the door, careful not to brush against anything that would make noise. She paused by Rachel, squatting to stare at the face of the woman she had almost come to trust. Crying happened, but it was silent. Had Rachel not gone along with killing those men, this would have been much harder to do. She swiveled to stare at the smug curl on Zhar’s lips. Her mind filled with the sight of the daytime sky swallowed by the impenetrable dark of a mountain tunnel, never to be seen again. The image of Zhar presenting her to a faceless chief in the mine-village consumed her thoughts before a cage door slammed in her face.

  Night left the once-scalding stone path icy beneath her feet. Tattered bits of leather strand whipped about her legs as she ran along the strange surface. This road, as Rachel had called it, was unyielding to her step, but left no footprints anyone could follow. She was sure either Zhar or Rachel would come looking for her, one for greed and one for concern. Her pace slowed to a backwards walk and she glanced at the building. Streaks of violet moonlight gleamed in color where the silver trim remained intact, stark against the muted greys of her nighttime world. Arms folded across her chest, s
he stopped with her feet together, shivering in the breeze and having second thoughts about her destiny.

  Rachel was the main reason she hesitated; she thought back to the splashing and the laughter, and felt guilty for leaving without saying goodbye. Now free, Althea had gone from caretaker to child, a feeling she had longed for. If she stayed, Zhar would take her just like the raiders had. With a sad nod, she looked down at her toes, lifting and dropping them in cascades as she weighed whether to run away or go back.

  Her presence among the women had already caused a rift between Zhar and Rachel, and now she felt it widening over the issue of where to take her. Rachel was not happy about forcing her away from her home, but had come short of challenging Zhar. This world must have been like a nightmare for her, going to sleep in the before-time and waking up after everything had come to an end. Captivity was a tolerable thing as long as she could help people. She did not like the idea of hiding away under a mountain for the rest of her life while everyone out here suffered. Perhaps if she left, the two women could get along. She hoped Rachel would be happy.

  Althea forced herself to look away from the building, mouthed a silent apology to her almost-friend, and walked once more up to a run.

  istant canines howled over the wind. Head-sized scrub brush slid through the shifting gradient of dark. She dared not look back again in case someone spotted the glow. Eventually, her gait slowed as fatigue and lack of food combined to an overall discomfort. With the sound of the wind and her heartbeat in her head, the fear came. For the first time, she was alone in the world with no one controlling her. That also meant no one protected her. Her stride picked up confidence as she mused about a life of her own. Traveling the Badlands, she could help whoever needed it and keep the bad people in check with her other abilities.

  If it was true some people deserved to die, the lesser axiom of some people deserved to be compelled to go away also seemed like it would be true.

  Her fantasy popped with the unexpected sight of a forest emerging from the dry ground up ahead, quite out of place for this part of the Badlands. She had never seen trees like this before; the ones by Den’s village were irregular and wide with broad leaves that shifted color with the seasons. These were far taller, straight and thick, bristling with green needles. If nothing else, tree cover could shield her from the cold desert night wind, as well as creatures. Out of breath, she loped off the road across a patch of dirt toward the strange wood.

  The presence of something in the air hung over this place, but nothing looked out of place. Ten feet from the closest tree, a tingle spread through her face. It started at her nose, matched by a similar feeling in her leading foot. Althea froze as a phantasmal caress crept over her head like she had walked into a cobweb. While she hesitated in place, her hair rose of its own accord and spread out and up.

  The strands of her skirt followed suit, lifting and separating from each other as if the leather repelled itself. Waving a hand, she found coolness in the air, defined and precise like a wall of a different temperature. At one point it was cool and dry, and two inches later, it was cold and not so dry. She looked to either side, at bizarre metal trees, devoid of leaves, standing in line with the separation. Bulbous parts along its length glowed in thin slats; she assumed the unexplained objects had something to do with her levitating hair.

  She took a step forward and her hair and skirt fell back into place, free of whatever energy field had charged them. The ground here was different from the sand, dark and heavy. Her toes sank into its wet softness. The aroma of the forest held her awe for a moment until her fatigue overcame her. Althea sat at the base of a tree and curled against it, trying to think about anything but Rachel.

  Hours later, she awoke, huddled against the tree where she had taken a nap. The sun was out now, shining through the shifting pines above her. She squinted at the light, smiling at the wind on her face and the beautiful caress of freedom upon her cheek. Hunger clawed its way into her consciousness; she stretched and went off in search of food.

  Althea avoided mushrooms. She knew some of them looked like ones you could eat but they would kill you, and she could not remember how to tell the good ones. She foraged around for some time with little success. This place was not natural. Despite the pleasant ambiance of it, the more she looked around, the more she sensed a certain wrongness to the area. She knew there were other mystics among the Scrags; some might have magic she did not know. Maybe this forest was the domain of one such mystic, and she could find a Cha’dom here. If she could find his home, he might help her find Den.

  Deeper into the forest she walked, feeling tiny and alone among the towering trees. The whisper of the wind became a pleasant companion as she lost herself in the new experience of being in control of her own life. Althea giggled and grinned as she stepped across rocks in a bubbling brook.

  The meandering walk ended some time later. Discomfort at being alone spread like a cancer in her thoughts, soon eclipsing everything else she tried to think about. Althea loved people, and the hollow feeling borne from the fact there were none here grew as intolerable as a little cage in a snake oil salesman’s wagon.

  She pined for Rachel and sank into a squat, picking at the dirt in front of her feet, feeling quite silly for running off in the middle of the night. Pouting at the soil, she dwelled on the guilt of what it must have done to her friend to wake up and find her missing. The longer she thought on it, the more she felt like going back to them.

  The scent of something edible drifted along the wind for the scarcest of moments, drawing her attention like a starving coyote. Althea leapt up and ran into the wind, leaping across a fallen log before splashing through a knee-high creek, sniffing for any sign of the fragrance.

  Althea stood on her toes, waving her face back and forth with her nose in the air, desperate to extract any trace of the aroma. As another whiff floated past. She ran again, moving in a series of jumps and dashes through the underbrush, over fallen logs and around great, smooth square stones as tall as her shoulders. Curious at their unusual flatness, she touched one and found it to be metal. The sight of many of the strange boulders, gleaming white against the dark greens of the forest, brought her speed down to a timid walk. The smell changed; no longer reminiscent of something edible, it wrapped its tendrils around her throat and choked the air out of her lungs.

  Dead things.

  With an arm over her mouth, she crept closer. The cubes had words printed on them; they must be boxes. She had seen similar objects before, but these were different; they had no lids or handles. The only break in their plain exterior was a small grid of glowing crystals with more writing on them.

  At the top of a hill, she looked down a broken path through the vegetation at a silver vehicle with six fat, almost spherical, tires clawing feebly at the air. It had rolled on its back like some giant dead bug. Two men lay motionless on the ground, wearing unfamiliar clothing saturated with blood and bullet holes.

  Althea ran to them without hesitation, sprawling on her knees by each man in turn and checking to see if she could do anything for them. Both had been dead more than a few days and had enough bullets in them to kill an entire raider encampment. She scrunched up her nose, confused why anyone would shoot one man hundreds of times.

  The back end of the strange vehicle hung open and it had disgorged a number of other boxes. A few had burst, and among the many items she did not recognize, she found one that looked familiar. It resembled the strange food-bar the raider had given her, only it was wider and longer by a margin on either side. The material wrapping it had words and a picture of a smiling little boy next to something that looked like a rectangular turd.

  Althea stared at the thing in her hand, confused by who would wrap such things in plastic. Curiosity got the better of her and she peeled it open. The sweet scent of chocolate greeted her, a fragrance that awakened a long dormant memory of a man and a woman giving her a treat. Gripping it with both hands, she plunged the bar into her mouth a
nd savaged it. With eager whimpers, she rooted through the debris hunting for more. Finding another, she took her time with the second one, savoring the taste as she sat against the metal insect.

  Once the last bits of chocolate were licked from her fingers, wiped from her face, and licked again, she crawled into the hollow creature and searched for more food. Gathering what seemed usable, she made a pile to take with her and hunted for a satchel or bag to put it all in. Somewhere between the first and second candy bar, she had made up her mind she would return to Rachel as soon as she discovered a way to find her.

  The dead men had strange things on them. Althea picked through their pockets, momentarily entranced by her reflection upon a slab of black glass with rounded corners. As she turned it over, it beeped, causing her to drop it and jump back. Glowing words appeared on one face of it, lingering for half a minute before it became dark again.

  Unsettled, she made a face at the area around the two dead men and backed away.

  “Sorry.”

  Whatever she had eaten had left her thirsty, and she jogged toward the sound of a creek with an empty plastic bottle she found in the wreck. She clutched the bottle in her teeth and navigated on all fours over slick rocks to the water’s edge. Cold, slimy green moss squished through her toes as she carefully set her feet on stable footing and squatted, holding the container beneath the surface to fill it. She brought it to her mouth with both hands, drinking and wearing equal parts. Most bad things in the water she could rid herself of with little effort. This stream was cold, and in comparison to what she usually drank, was clean.

  Her third mouthful startled into a spray at a sudden mechanical whine punctuated by staccato clicking behind her. She twisted to the left; a glint of daylight drew her gaze to a man’s torso stuck in the rocks downstream, covered in metal. In place of arms, two spinning bundles of rods pointed at her. Its face looked inhuman, also made of metal with eyes that glowed just like hers, only amber.