Scavengers

by Darren Simpson

  The gloom was pierced in places by rods of light, which came down from holes in the corrugated roof. Surrounded by pallets and stacks of metal racks, Landfill continued along the tracks, passing carts and locomotives shrouded in dust. Bats dangled overhead in quiet clusters.

  Landfill passed workbenches and lockers, and was soon following a corridor that became increasingly dark. After turning a corner, he reached out with a toe to touch something hard and smooth. Crouching down, he found a horizontal metal hoop and twisted it with both hands. A loud clunk resonated through the corridor, and Landfill grunted while heaving up the trapdoor to which the hoop was attached. After getting to his knees, he found some rungs and climbed through the hatch.

  Descending the ladder felt like descending into blindness. Not a trace of light entered these depths. There was nothing for the eye to adjust to; just pure, uncompromising, all-consuming blackness.

  Landfill finally felt the floor beneath his soles, left the ladder and searched his shorts for his lighter. He could hear sounds of scuttling, and the sudden flare of his lighter sent pale, translucent creatures scurrying into shadows. Landfill was quick enough to trap one beneath the ball of his foot. He crouched to grab it and raised it to the lighter. It was a plump white millipede, with transparent legs that writhed against his palm.

  “Rule twenty-one,” mumbled Landfill. “Never hurt Hinterland’s animals.”

  Keeping hold of the millipede, he crept through the tight, musty space and found a low aperture in the far wall. He had to pocket his lighter to worm his way through the gap. When he was on the other side, the ignition of his flame caused a thin chittering to fill the stony chamber.

  “It’s okay, Longwhite,” whispered Landfill. He squinted into the darkness at the end of the chamber, where the light failed to penetrate an intestinal mess of piping. “Just me.”

  The darkness chittered again.

  “Yes. Got something. Wouldn’t come empty-handed.” Landfill held up the millipede that was curled around his wrist. “Um, Longwhite… When I told you about the rule against harming Hinterland’s amnals, you said this doesn’t…count. Since you’d catch them anyway. But… But what if some might have scarpered? This millipede might’ve given you the slip and escaped.”

  For the briefest moment, two ruby eyes caught the lighter’s glare. Landfill nodded.

  “Okay. They’d never slip your fangs.” He raised the millipede to his face and – after mouthing a silent sorry – threw it at the tangled pipes. In the light of one flicker from his lighter, the millipede was suspended in the air; with the next it was gone.

  Landfill had to look at his feet while quiet sounds of crunching came from the darkness. When the noises stopped he looked up, sniffed and wiped his nose. “Talking of rules, I’ve broken a few.”

  Those flashing red eyes.

  “I don’t know why.” Landfill grimaced and scratched his head. “I saw something. It was Woolf. She had the swelling. I should’ve stayed away, but I was worried. You know how I like Woolf. But I saw… I saw wooflings come from inside her. From inside her body.”

  Darkness chattered.

  “I know!” Landfill’s eyes were wide in the trembling light. “Babagoo always said the small amnals come from Outside. Said the swelling’s an illness. But now he’s said it’s not true. The smaller amnals come from inside bigger amnals! The swelling’s not an illness. It’s how smaller amnals fit in the big ones!”

  The light rose as Landfill put both hands to his head. “I’d pondered before. Small amnals usually came in while bigger ones healed from the swelling. Like a pattern. It made me wonder…”

  He lowered his hands and shook his head. “Longwhite… It was such a thing to see. And other amnals have been doing it too! But Babagoo didn’t tell me. He’s been lying about it. It makes you…think.”

  Something moved behind the pipes. Something pale and slinking.

  “I asked him why. He said it was to protect me. From the Outsiders. But how’s that right? How can knowing make danger?”

  Landfill’s eyes narrowed. “Rule eleven – stay away from amnals with the swelling. Babagoo said that rule’s to keep me safe. Like the other rules. But it wasn’t keeping me safe from the swelling. It was keeping me from…from something Babagoo doesn’t want me to know.

  “I couldn’t stop thinking. About Babagoo and the rules. One rule kept bubbling in my head – rule twelve. Never rise above the wall. It wouldn’t leave me be, and while Babagoo slumbered I climbed the conveyor. Was thinking of the birds, Longwhite – of how high they go. Of what it feels like up there. Always wanted to know. Wanted to see what they see. Never would have gone up before. But after what happened…”

  A curt squeal.

  “What’d I see? I don’t know. Can’t understand it. But Longwhite…” Landfill covered his mouth and forced a loud breath through his fingers. “I saw Outside. I saw it. Over the wall there’s for ever. The stars don’t stop. They go on and on and they’re everywhere. There’s light and there’s dark. There’s something so…big it swallows you up.”

  The boy started hopping gently from foot to foot.

  “And that’s not all! While I was up there, Hunger’s Eye came! I looked right at it! Was like… Like a bird made of night, pulling a red star. And it came right for me! But look!” He gestured from his head to his toes with shaking hands. “I’m here! Nothing happened. Except Babagoo caught me out. Went into one of his fits. Said I only gave it the slip because it was dark. But he’s said before that it sees just as well at night.”

  Two glints of crimson. A flash of fur.

  Landfill breathed deeply at the cool, musky air, then sat cross-legged on the stone floor. “It gets the grey stuff mulling. About Babagoo. He always said the little amnals come from Outside; but when I gander something else he says they come from bigger amnals. He always said a look from Hunger’s Eye would have me snatched by the Outsiders; but then he says it can miss you. So why not say these things from the start?”

  He sucked in his top lip. “What else isn’t he telling me, Longwhite? He keeps things from me. Like… Just this morning I saw blood in his squirts. He tried to tell me it was ‘nothing to worry about–’” Landfill coarsened his voice in imitation of the scavenger – “but I could see it was. He looked all worrisome, and he was trying to hide it.

  “There’s another thing he won’t tell me, too. Do you know about the thing around his neck? Never takes it off, and won’t let me near it. When I ask about it he gets cranky. Insists it’s a pendant. But I know it’s a key.”

  The boy took his own key from his shorts and held it up. “Just like this one. Found it ages ago, in a locker in the Rippletop. Locks and unlocks the door. But what does Babagoo’s key unlock?”

  Landfill shook his fringe. “Rule four,” he muttered. “Believe only Babagoo.”

  He grabbed some rubble and lobbed it through musty air. A shrill hiss filled the chamber.

  “Sorry, Longwhite. But do you see what I mean? There’s fibbery and secrets. Babagoo even said there’s something he doesn’t want me to know. And when I think about it…there are secrets I have too. Like you. He doesn’t know about you, Longwhite. You’re the only amnal he hasn’t named. He doesn’t even know about this place. Haven’t told him, because I like it here. I like having it…just for me. And I want to keep you to myself. Is that wrong?”

  The pipes scuffled and rang.

  “But it feels wrong.” Landfill shrugged. “Babagoo always jabbers about trust. But…” He licked the top of his wrist and rubbed it against his cheek. “He says the hunger makes the Outsiders cheat each other. Says they’re full of rot and lies. But me and Babagoo are keeping secrets from each other!”

  Landfill sighed glumly. “Maybe we’re like the Outsiders. Maybe the hunger’s got into Hinterland and infected us. Maybe you don’t know when you’ve got it. Babagoo says it’s agony but…I’m not so sure about what he says.” He groaned and rubbed his eyes.

  Movement behind the
pipes. The darkness chattered quietly.

  Landfill rubbed his ear. “Course I want to know more. But how?”

  It chattered again.

  “A secret?”

  Darkness replied, and Landfill listened.

  Every dawn during his daily inspection, Landfill thought of Longwhite’s advice. He studied the wall not only for signs of tampering, but for the best place to begin work on a secret he wasn’t sure he wanted: his own tunnel to Outside.

  It didn’t take long to find it: a small section of wall parallel to the Rippletop’s side. It was tucked into a blind spot between two of the rickety, vine-choked cabins that skirted the warehouse’s wall, and had slightly sparer foliage around its base. Whenever Landfill reached that stretch he’d stop, look the wall up and down and check how far left and right he could move before seeing around the surrounding cabins.

  One day, after Babagoo had entered the cabinet for his afternoon trip to the Pit, Landfill took a detour before attending to his chores at the vegetable patch. He crossed the Gully and whipped through the Woods, and was soon loping through the Ivy Stack’s entrance.

  After a few moments, he popped his head back out, checked for Babagoo, and sprinted – with head bent low and shovel in hand – for the Rippletop. He hid the shovel behind some rusted, sloping shelves in one of the cabins, clapped the soot from his hands and raced to the vegetable patch.

  During the next few days’ inspections, Landfill paused by the cabins to retrieve the shovel and work on his secret. He’d soon cut through the nettles at the base of his chosen patch of wall, and carefully moulded a blanket of vegetation that could be propped on some chair legs from the cabin. His hands and wrists were red and itchy from the task – something he blamed on a tumble near some nettles when Babagoo asked – but it was a small price to pay for hiding his secret.

  Each day, with foxes occasionally looking on, Landfill would prop up this dense, prickly blanket, then dig up a few shovelfuls of dirt before distributing them evenly around the cabins. Then he’d drop the blanket, arrange its foliage, restore the shovel and chair legs to their hiding place and continue on his journey around Hinterland’s perimeter.

  One morning, Landfill was working on his secret in heavy rain. The hole was getting fairly deep now – so deep that he had to dig on his knees – but the wall’s foundations seemed to go on for ever. He dug for longer than usual, wondering whether the wall would ever actually end.

  Suddenly, his nostrils twitched.

  There was a new scent in the air. It was fainter than the must of freshly churned mud, and partially hidden behind the rain’s fresh, metallic fragrance.

  Landfill turned to two foxes who’d been watching him dig. “You smell it, foxlers?” He sniffed again. The scent was stronger now – a fetid, sour tang…

  Landfill jolted when he realized Kafka was nearby. There was another scent too. Kafka wasn’t alone.

  Sensing his rising panic, the foxes exchanged glances and scarpered into their cabins. The scent intensified.

  Landfill was scooping mud back into the hole when he heard Babagoo’s voice from the south side of the Rippletop.

  “Landfill! Where are you, my boy? Quick meat at the Pit today. Thought we could have an early breakfast and squeeze in some dominoes before chores.”

  Panting quickly, Landfill got the remaining dirt back into the hole as quickly as he could. He kicked the chair legs away so the blanket fell over them and covered his secret.

  Babagoo was close now – he must have been walking between the wall and the cabins. It was only a matter of seconds before Landfill would be in his sight.

  Landfill looked in the direction of Babagoo’s footsteps, then looked down to find the shovel still in his hands. When he clocked Babagoo’s boot extending from the corner of a cabin he spun from the wall and tossed the shovel into the air. It landed with a loud thump on the cabin’s roof, and slid down the felted slope before stopping with a clang against some guttering.

  “There you are,” grunted Babagoo. While Kafka’s horizontal pupils were fixed on Landfill, Babagoo’s eyes darted around. “Only at the cabins? Should be on the south side by now. And what was that noise? All that banging…” His lips tightened when his gaze settled on the boy. “And why’s that look on your face? I know that look. What’ve you done?”

  Landfill put his hands in his hair and looked at the ground.

  “Spit it out, Landfill. What were you up to? What was that noise?”

  Landfill raised his eyes to Babagoo. His expression wavered when he spotted something in his peripheral vision: the tip of the shovel protruding over the gutter’s edge. Landfill caught himself before looking at it outright, and bowed his head again.

  Babagoo moved towards him. “So this is how you regain my trust, is it? By getting up to no good?” He swivelled his head in search of clues, causing the ears on his hat to flap up and down.

  When Babagoo started to search above face-level, Landfill shouted: “I was kicking the cabin, okay? Seeing if I could break it.”

  Babagoo stared at him, his mouth agape and trembling. He glanced back towards Kafka, who was watching the scene with his usual dull expression. Babagoo clenched his fists and turned back to the boy. “I beg your pardon? I hope I misheard, Landfill. It sounded like you said you were kicking the cabin and trying to break things.”

  Landfill sniffed in the rain. His pout began to loosen. “Sorry, Babagoo. I’m really sorry.”

  “Rule fifteen…”

  “I know, Babagoo. I know.”

  “Number fifteen. What is it?”

  “Look after Hinterland as it looks after us.”

  “That’s right. And is that what you were doing there, lad, when you were kicking cabins and doing who knows what damage? That’s you looking after Hinterland, is it?”

  Landfill clasped his hands together and gave his most repentant look. “I’m really sorry, Babagoo. Don’t know why I did it. Wasn’t thinking. It—”

  “No!” snapped Babagoo. “You never do seem to think these days, do you!” How can you be so stupid, Landfill? How can you be so disrespectful? And I don’t mean just to me. I mean to Hinterland! This place is the only thing that separates us from Outside. It’s practically…sacred! Do you know how hard I work to maintain this place? Do you have any idea how hard it is to fight the rot and the rust and the weeds? And what are you doing? You’re trying to…to smash the place up!”

  “Baba—”

  “Shut up. Shut that puny, ungrateful jabberhole. I don’t want to hear your ugly little voice. In fact, I don’t want to even look at you. Go to the Den and think about what you’ve done. I’ll finish checking the wall. At least someone around here gives a scat.”

  Landfill sagged, nodded and turned away. As soon as he’d gained enough distance from the scavenger and goat, he allowed a sigh of relief to pass his lips.

  After that, Landfill made sure his digging stints were brief. One morning, while digging so deep that he had to stand inside the hole, Landfill was surprised by one of the foxes, who came in close to sniff at the cavity’s edge.

  “What is it, Rushdie? You smell something?” The fox was joined by another. “You too? What is it?”

  Landfill crouched to inspect the hole, but nothing looked any different. It was the same old hole, with the same hard, vertical edge of the wall’s foundation at its far side.

  Landfill nudged the foxes away, checked about him and crouched within the hollow. He poked and rummaged with his shovel and, after digging up more dirt, noticed that something felt different. When he jabbed beneath the bottom of the lowest brick, the shovel met very little resistance. He jabbed again and scraped mud away with the shovel’s tip, and froze when he comprehended that the hole was moving horizontally. It was creeping towards Outside.

  The shovel dropped from the boy’s hand, and the foxes watched him climb quickly out from the hole. Once out, he got to his feet and backed slowly away, with his eyes fixed all the while on the opening. He barel
y seemed to breathe, and his face was unusually pale.

  After licking his wrist and wiping it through his hair, Landfill blinked and moved abruptly back to the hole. There was something mechanical in the way he pushed mud back in, in the way he tidied the foliage and returned the shovel and chair legs to the cabin. When he was finished he threw a look at the foxes, then sprinted to the Gully to wash the dirt away before resuming his inspection of the perimeter wall.

  Several days later, Landfill was teasing cats in the Den while waiting for Babagoo to return from the Spit Pit. The boy no longer worked on his secret. Every time he passed the cabins during inspections, he’d slow to stare at the foliage covering the hole, but that was all. Sometimes the foxes left their cabins to look expectantly at him with bright, amber eyes. But Landfill always shook his head and moved on.

  When Babagoo arrived at the Den with his bags, they exchanged silent greetings, and Landfill noticed the key glinting between the folds of Babagoo’s overcoat.

  Shortly after that, while preparing gulls in the bathtub, he stopped gutting dinner and stared at the blood crusting beneath his fingernails. “Babagoo?” He didn’t turn to address him.

  “Hmm?” Babagoo’s voice came from the stove.

  “Your pendant’s out.”

  The scavenger grunted, and Landfill heard a quiet rustle as he put the key away.

  Landfill tossed some gore to the cats and sliced into another gull. He cleared his throat before speaking again. “You use it in the Spit Pit?”

  “Eh?”

  “The…pendant. Sometimes it’s out when you leave the cabinet. Is it something you use at the Pit?”

  Landfill turned his head, just a little. He could just make out Babagoo frowning and exploring his nostril with a blackened fingernail.

  “We’ve talked about the pendant, boy. It’s not used for anything.”

  Blood flashed on Landfill’s forearms while he hacked at the bird. “Nothing at all? It’s got little prongs. Look like they do something.”