Feed the Machine (5 page)

“Meat,” hissed the Scab and licked his lips.

A flash of black, like the shadows of the hole had birthed a demon. Kin was on his face, slashing with his sharpened claws, howling with fury. The claws that could easily pierce metal ripped the fragile skin of his face apart, tore at his eyes. The Scab yelled, waving a hand up, reaching for a monster he could not grasp and as he fell backwards he pulled the crossbow trigger.

Ash felt a thud and a prick of pain as the bolt leapt the distance. It pierced the pack, breaking watches. It was held back from killing him by broken metal and his father’s pack. The Scab crashed to the ground and dropped the crossbow which promptly slid off the edge of the hole.

He grabbed for Kin but he was gone, leaping across the hole, landing near Ash’s feet.

“Cut the rope!” he howled.

Ash pulled up his cutter and slashed away the rope connecting him to the pinions. It parted under the beam.

“Run,” Kin yelled, halfway up the side of the depression already.

Ash turned and scrambled up behind him, the junk sliding under his hands and feet. Pain blossomed as he grabbed sharp edges but it was distant, overcome by the roaring of blood in his ears, the harsh pain of his breath in his chest. The Scab bolt was still sticking out of the pack, the sharpened tip pricking his stomach.

He reached the top and saw Raj. He was running down the other side, crunching through the junk, Chirp flying above. There was a shout from behind him and Ash looked back.

Scabs. Men and women scarred and burned red and brown by the sun came over the hill screaming, their sharpened teeth glinting silver. Ash took it in, the world slowing. Thick boots of leather and steel so they could run at full speed across spiky junk. Strips of fabric around their hips.

Each and every single one of them carrying a crossbow with a shiny bolt loaded.

Ash leapt, an awkward blind dive down the hill but he wasn’t fast enough. An explosion of pain burst from the left side of his face as a bolt sliced across his cheek and through the outer edge of his ear.

He crashed to the ground, landing hard on his side. The bolt sticking from his pack tore, widening the hole. There was pain everywhere now. His face, elbows and thighs all bleeding from sharp edges.

Driven by fear he was up and running in what seemed like an instant. Every footstep sank into the nuts and bolts, their edges hard against his thin shoes. Kin leapt from flat pieces of concrete and he followed, playing leapfrog as he bolted.

Moments.

A crossbow bolt thudded into broken fridge door next to him. He felt the wind of it pass his hand.

The bottom of the hill, exposed but still running.

Legs burning.

Ash ran, the thin sole of his shoes ripping away. The air itself burning like acid. Another bolt hit the junk and shot sideways, whispering across his throat.

A misplaced footstep and the pile rushed up to meet him.

He crashed down in a shower of metal, heard fabric ripping, sudden agony in his knee.

No time to stop, can’t stop but the pain demanded he slow, that he expose his back to Scabs and their metal bolts.

The top of this hill and Raj, standing tall, hurling stones at their pursuers.

Ash felt them under his hands—round stones, smooth but heavy, like something from a rich man’s fake garden bed. He grabbed two and stood, turning around in time to see a Scab get one in the face, crashing down into the pile, a thin splatter of blood dusting the sky.

The Scabs were spread out down the hill. Some were still running towards them but others were staggering or lying still, blood streaked down their faces.

Ash threw a stone but missed. The Scab took two more steps towards them before Raj’s stone connected with an enormous crack on the side of his head. He dropped to the ground and started shaking.

Ash hit two more Scabs but Raj took them down. His aim was unerring, the heavy stones flinging out over the distance and crashing into skulls and faces.

One raised his crossbow and fired it but it went wide, shooting out in an arc to land somewhere behind them. A moment later Raj felled him.

Another Scab appeared on top of the hill. He was tall and unlike most of the Scabs, seemed to be solid muscle. Well-fed. He shouted out something and in an instant the pursuing Scabs turned away from Ash and Raj.

“Let’s go,” Kin said from somewhere near their feet.

Ash dropped the stone he was holding and turned away from the retreating Scabs. His mind was still whirling. Raj had bolted, running away, leaving Ash behind but then Raj had saved him, hurling rocks with eerie precision. These thoughts came and went in a flash.

They went over the hill and clambered down the other side, moving as fast as they could.

Something bounced off Ash’s knee and clinked as it hit the junk. A gold watch, gleaming. It had fallen out the wide hole torn in the front of his pack. He clamped his hand across it and scooped up the watch, the muscles in his back burning. He slipped it into the pack. It felt lighter than before but he couldn’t go back now to retrieve his lost fortune.

The Scabs were still yelling in the distance and a thousand injuries were making themselves known but some quiet part of Ash’s mind was weighing his pack in his hands, estimating losses, calculating if he had enough to pay off the quota.

“My pack is still full,” Raj gasped, as though reading his mind.

“Okay,” Ash said, forcing the word out over his dry tongue and cracked lips.

He touched his belt, found his water bottle was still connected. So were his bugs—only eight now, two left behind in the hole. He unscrewed the water bottle and gulped down a warm mouthful, drinking far more than he intended. He swallowed more, unable to stop himself. He seemed dry to his bones, the water doing nothing to satisfy his thirst.

“We gotta move faster,” Raj said, gulping down water too.

Ash looked at his friend and saw his hands were bloody, no doubt from the rush through the Scour. His pants were covered in dots of blood.

“Let’s go,” Ash said.

But they couldn’t speed up. Ash’s feet were aching and every step was a kind of numbing pain. He seemed to have used up all his energy running from the Scabs and now he had nothing left. He fumbled for some pap, swallowed it down with another precious mouthful of water and kept moving. Just one more step. Just one more step.

The Scabs’ shouting and hooting grew fainter as they climbed another hill and down again. Ash looked back for a moment. There was a man in the distance, sunlight glinting from a pair of binoculars. Then he was lost behind the junk peak.

Even with the missile hole to distract them, they both knew the Scabs would follow them. They never gave up chasing their prey, sometimes even coming within sight of town. They were excellent trackers and also insane enough to move around after dark, fighting hazels and taking their teeth to make weapons.

Soon Ash couldn’t hear the Scabs at all. There was only his breath, the monotony of walking and the harsh sun.

“Faster, faster,” Kin called from time to time and they would try to speed up but soon fall back to a trudge. They passed overhangs of cool shadow and all Ash wanted to do was sit down, to rest, to escape the blistering sun. Mindless as he was, he knew if they stopped they wouldn’t get up again.

His mind drifted, imagining Cago’s gates, the three fences. In, past the guards, walking on dirt and sometimes cobblestones. Down a narrow street, the houses slumping against one another, boarded-up windows, rusty iron roofs. A blue door cracked and weathered but
his
door,
his
home, open and it’s cool inside, like the Wire Pub and Silver and Nola are there. Their mother comes in from the next room and hands him a glass of cool water, droplets beading on the side of it.

The past and present blurred together. Their two-room hovel expanded. More rooms, soft carpet, cool polished wood. A tall white refrigerator filled with meat and orange juice. Endless food and endless bugs.

His father, a tall black streak with a grinning white smile appearing from the kitchen, walking towards him, his arms outstretched—

Ash slid down the face of the junk cliff and crashed to the ground. Thankfully it was mostly rubble with a few pieces of iron sticking out. He saw a broken wheel. It resolved itself into a busted pram. The one they’d searched through earlier today.

Crunching metal and footsteps and then Raj was by his side holding out his hand.

Ash took it and together they managed to get him up.

“Need to rest a minute,” Ash mumbled, his tongue swollen in his mouth.

Raj gave Ash some yellow pap which he accepted without speaking. It had flavor—a sort of faint chicken, slight saltiness and he washed it down with a gulp of water from his rapidly diminishing supply of water. Ash swayed on his feet, his mind throwing up random images and ideas.

Raj had abandoned him, running away to save his own skin but Ash knew there was nothing Raj could have done. If he’d waited for Ash they both would be dead right now, pierced with crossbow bolts.

His father had abandoned their entire family, running away to… what? Taking their entire fortune, dooming the family to years of poverty and degradation.

One day Nola would run away, perhaps as soon as she was eighteen and able to leave the family. Maybe even before.

And one day Silver would go too. She had bastardo blood in her, making her sick, an outcast, a burden. All bastardos started the same way and they all followed the same path. As soon as they were old enough they left, never to return to their homes.

A Scab, scarred and sunburned, walking through the junk, two bloody silver collars looped over his shoulder, Kin’s dead body in his hand.

Ash swallowed more water and forced himself to focus. He looked down at his shredded shoes and laughed. It was followed by a sob and a shuddering breath.

They had to get back. They had enough wealth to save both their families. Then they could return to the missile hole, retrieve the rest of the watches and live forever happy and fed.

Forever warm.

Ash looked up at Raj, feeling his mind piece itself together.

“You right?” Raj asked.

“Yeah.”

He swallowed the scant liquid in his mouth, about to say more when there was a crack, a piercing scream of a sound that turned into a roar of thunder and the ground shook. They both stumbled away from the edge of the pile as it shuddered and moved, pieces of metal and rubble falling down around them.

Ash went down on one knee but then managed to haul himself back to his feet. Behind them, a cloud of black smoke mushroomed up to the sky.

“Bye Scabs,” Ash said. He started laughing.

“Our fucking watches,” Raj said, his hands on his knees, tears streaking down his dirty face. For some reason this was hilarious and Ash soon was doubled over, laughing, gasping air, begging Raj to stop even as both of them said nonsense things and kept laughing.

It was Chirp fluttering down and yelling FUCK YES! in his high voice that brought both of them back to reality.

The missile may have killed the Scabs but even so, they had to get back to the cocoon and weld themselves in.

Ash stood upright, feeling his body aching.

“How long till sunset Kin?”

“Two hours, twenty-four minutes.”

“How long to reach last night’s camp at current speed?”

“Three hours, four minutes,” Kin said, trotting off ahead of them, leading the way.

They set off, the hot sun weakening as it made its descent. Ash wanted to jog, to move faster but his pack weighed him down, even half-empty. Even the bugs on his belt felt too much, swinging and banging against his leg.

They just had to reach the cocoon, weld themselves in and hope Scabs didn’t find them and there were no hungry hazels around.

Ash looked down at his feet. They were cut and had bled but his wounds seemed to have seared shut by the blistering sun. The delirium of the day threatened to return but as the sun dropped and the heat vanished, Ash found himself able to focus.

That meant he was able to worry.

Thirty minutes at least out after sunset. Thirty minutes walking around as a hazel meal.

Maybe they could weld in somewhere now instead?

He fumbled for his cutter and found it still attached to his belt. Twelve percent power. Enough to weld in and cut out but not enough to dig a new hole.

“How’s your power?”

Raj blinked himself out of a daze. He checked his cutter.

“Eighteen percent,” he said. He shrugged, his pack creaking.

His pack is full and yours is half-empty and he is stronger than you and better and —

The thought streaked through Ash’s mind but then evaporated, wisping away like it had never been.

Soon the light turned red and patches of shadows appeared along their dusty path. The sun would drop behind the hills and it wouldn’t be long before the hazels crept out of their dens. Ash glanced back and saw dark clouds massing on the horizon.