Mom, Dad, Sam, they were all fast asleep when I woke in the noon heat. “GeeWhiz! How can they sleep in this?” I asked. Nobody answered. I remembered there were others around us and ducked my head a bit to see if woke anyone unintended. My fingers, toes, elbow, and knee joints burned as the sweat ran over skin rubbed raw from the sand. I couldn’t sleep.
The tent was lit up like the inside of a lightbulb. It was a wonder that any of the 20 or so in our tent managed to sleep. Then, I noticed the light reflecting from a pair of black eyes. It was a boy about my age, just laying motionless and watching me.
I gave him the dude nod. The, “yeah, I see you watching me. We cool?” nod.
He just laid there, not blinking, eyes fixed on me.
I got up, quiet as a mouse, and stepped lightly on the floor. Looking back to surveille my captors, I determined it was safe to advance.
I crept to the entrance of the tent, then paused again. Not a stir.
I emerged from the tent into a blinding display of light. “And, I thought the tent was bad?” A tap on my shoulder and I nearly let out a war cry! Spinning around I saw a pair of sunglasses, offered by the boy in the tent.
“Shemmy,” he returned the dude nod, wearing his own pair of shades.
Putting the dark glasses on I could feel my face relax all over, “I’m T-...Troy”.
“Welcome T-Troy,” Shemmy said earnestly and low enough to not be heard from inside the tent.
“No, no, no. Just Troy,” first impressions were important, and I could let this guy go around sharing ideas with Sam for how to further decompensate my name.
Shemmy looked slightly puzzled but accepted it. “You’re new, huh? Do you want to see it?” his eyebrows raised in a oh yeah you do fashion.
I pursed my lips and returned the nod, ”oh yeah, I do.”
Shemmy grabbed a sunbrella from a canister by the tent door and led me through a maze of tents to the noisy end of camp.
It was still 500 meters away, but even at that distance, the gaping hole was massive, spanning roughly 40 meters across, and 30 meters tall in the greater half of a semi-circle arch covering eight lanes of highway. “Sub 42,” I said mostly to myself.
“The Hellmouth!” Shemmy embellished my tone as if I had been disrespectful. The sharpness of the colors and details of the structure blurred into the gray-blue haze of heated distance. I could see an unending stream of ants disappearing into the gash in the Earth. Straining my eyes to look closer, I could tell that the ants were actually fully-loaded 18-wheelers hurrying into the hole.
Laying out before the Hellmouth in a fanning crescent was our ad hoc tent-town that had popped up to temporarily house the influx of permanent transients that pushed new rows of canvas tents into the desert with every passing week. True to his style, Hans had constructed an efficient road system with water and sewage utilities. Efficient and spartan. The tents were large, housing about 20 - 25 people each. The rigging was steel and sleeping quarters seemed designed to encourage only temporary residency. Some of the tents had special purposes, such as the “mess hall” or cafeteria I would call it. There was one for medical care and for cleaning up. We were rationed 16 liters of water a day here, for washing and drinking. I think none was spent on the restroom, or “latrine” as they called it. They smelled really bad.
After a few minutes, the interest in the Hellmouth waned and I turned back to Shemmy.
“You wanna see something, cool?” he asked with the same raised eyebrows.
I returned the nod.
Taking me back through camp a bit and then over a grassy hill, Shemmy paused and looked around cautiously. Encouraging me to follow, he crouched down and walked silently up the path. A little further till he paused again, and surveyed the path ahead. Looking back at me he pointed to his eyes with his index and pointer finger and then down to the ground. There was a large line of massive ants coursing by my feet going to and from whatever lay ahead. I smelled that we were getting close.
The carrion let out a cacophony of racket as we emerged from behind the hill. Some continued to rip and gnash at their pray while those closest to us raised their wings threateningly, mouths agape to bellow with sinew and gore dripping. I had never seen anything like it and it rocked me back on my heels.
“RAWR!!!” Shemmy lept into action, charging the wake of carrion. He cycled through opening and closing the sunbrella with a rapid whooshing that drove the birds back from the carcass. A few tenacious samples continued to rip at the entrails until their instincts finally pulled them back to the ring about 10 feet away. They eyed us and squawked loudly at us that they were here first, this was their prize.
Taking my attention from the vultures, I looked down at the carcass. It was a ruin, the birds had strewn its entrails and muscles about such that they could each have a go. The fur was still quite pretty where it was still intact. Dark brown with copper shades and some white tips.
“It was a jackall,” Shemme offered. “Venkat killed it a night ago. They come in and steal from us.”
The vultures were closing in again, eyeing us, trying to gauge how willing we were to fight for this meal we weren’t even eating. Shemmy picked up a stone, and that gave the birds a pause. I looked down and saw the purple entrails, swollen in the hot sun. My face changed to a pinched disgust.
“That could be, you know? We’re all just meat,” he said mechanically. I could tell they weren’t his words. Someone had put them there.
I stared at the ruined carcass. The vultures had made a mess of the entrails and the flow of ants was carrying off small chunks of flesh, sometimes in teams. Flies were closing in now too that we had given some reprieve from the carrion. The smell was awful and the whole scene was mesmerizing. I poked the bloated balloon of the stomach with a stick. “Oh, ew, *gag*”, I looked at Shemmy was grinning in disgust back at me.
Shemmy’s eyes widened a moment before I became aware. “TROY! TROY HULSE!!” I heard it. It was coming quickly, closing in on the racket of the birds. The damn birds heard it too and called back to her. “Troy, what are you doing out there?” Then she saw us, “Oh my god! What are you doing?” The vultures saw their opening and charged. Shemmy looked and me, and I at him and we knew the birds had the drop on us. There was only one option. We sprinted at mom with all the might our 10-year-old legs could muster. Shemmy flung the sunbrella back to give us an edge. The realization of terror took a hold of Mom and she turned from scolding to scooting right behind us back towards camp. She was surprisingly quick.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Shemmy and I were forced back to the tent under threat of death. It was the middle of the day so everyone was asleep or at least resting, so Mom couldn’t fully embrace her fury towards me. I lay back on the gritty cot and laid my head down. I looked away from Mom and observed the room. Shemmy gave me the nod and grin then closed his eyes.
***
The camp comes alive when the sun goes down. The camp lights burst on with an actual thunk and relight the cooling tents. The noise of strangers waking close to me, children laughing and the restless energy that imbued the camp reminded me of the stories I had seen of the Wild West.
Sam has been really upset since we arrived. I don’t think with anyone in particular. She seems equally pissed with Mom, Dad, and me. She only saved her good side for her friends back home. She was even snippy with the strangers around the camp, carrying herself around like she was better than everyone else around camp. She would call Shemmy and me “primitives” as we ran around nearly naked and our hair clumped and caked with dirt. The sunsuits were long since dismantled. Despite efforts at cleanliness, we lived in a tent town and squatting in the desert in front of the Hellmouth, Which made everyone end up looking primitive.
The intrigue of exploration drove Shemmy and me nightly into the streets. At first, I was practically crippled by the soreness of my muscles. I had never experienced the agonizing pain streaming through every tiny newfound muscle of my body before. Thankfully, that pain eventually subsided leaving me stronger and faster than I had ever experienced before, at least in real life.
We spent hours playing chase, hide & seek, and my favorite, “kill the spaz with the ball”, where the main goal was to acquire the ball and survive as long as you could on your feet before being squished like a bug beneath a dog-pile of dozens of sweaty, squirming kids. It was basically Rugby, with less rules and more smash. Success was measured in control, not goals.
In the early days, I was the last to get picked. Being on the small side of 10, I just looked like dead weight in a full-contact sport. Sam would feel sorry for me standing there with the other scrubs and pick me for her team.
***
“Loose!” a voice cries as the oblong ball sails into the air. Everyone positions. Only a fool would dare catch it from the toss-up. That was a good way to get your ribs broken. You need to wait for the first bounce. You need to be better at predicting the unpredictable trajectory of the ball from the bounce. You need to be faster than the others.
I see the coming bounce and sprint myself to position. I can’t get there early and plant my feet. I’m not big enough. I have to catch it on the run.
But some people fall ass-backwards into the right place and the right time. This time it was a big chunk with a meaty forehead. He wasn’t fast, but the ball springs straight into his arms before I can intercept. “Kill him!” the gaggle of sweaty murderous kids yell and began bouncing off Chunk as he lumbers through them like they are toddlers.
I don’t go in for the tackle, that’s not my role. Chunk puts up a valiant and yet brief effort. The toddlers eventually amassing enough clout to bring him down with a thud.
“Loose!” the ball flies up again further down the field in an effort to break up the crowd. That is good for me. I sprint down down and there are only a few of us out here in the open. I see the future trajectory from the bounce and slow my pace just enough to catch it on the..
“Go go go!” perfect timing the ball arcs over my shoulder and right into the basket of my arms. I’m off to the races! The field is an opening in the middle of the tents roughly 45 meters in diameter and roundish, ringed with lights and designed as a place for us. Most of the rocks and stuff have been removed over the years. The hoard locks me in their sights and closes in on my position. But I’m too quick. Some of the big ones are fast and they are closing in on me quickly from behind. But they can’t manage their inertia, I grin. The oblong ball is covered in a synthetic leather that glows the color of the winning team. There is a numeric readout on the ball that shows the margin of time for the winning team. It reads 16 seconds in white numbers on the red glowing ball for Chunk’s team when we brought him down. It flips to yellow as I sprint along.
Coming to a complete stop and reversing course to my rear right, they overrun me just as they are about to pounce. I dart back and forth until I am hemmed in by the enemy. Sam is on the other side of this human wall closing in, I have a split second, I know where she is. We have a connection.
“Sam!” I throw the ball high enough that the enemy can’t reach it. The yellow glowing ball lands directly in her hands and she takes off. One of the enemy pretends not to see that I no longer have the ball and hits me anyway. I don’t have time for revenge, I must get to Sam.
I take off in a mad dash. I can’t see Sam, but I see the general direction of the horde. She’s fast, but nobody can outrun them forever. I position myself out just far enough behind the human wall and call out to her in my mind, I’ve got you, I’m right here!
Again, the ball appears over the human wall, “loose!” someone yells, but it’s too late. The ball lands right in my basket as I sprint away from the pack. I glide along an open field, darting from assailants, I am untouchable. They finally work out a strategy and press me towards the edge of the field. They close in on me, and just before they think I’ll toss the ball myself to save my own skin…I rush the line of attackers. Just as I reach them, I drop to one foot and shin, letting my speed carry me in a slide right through their slow oafish grasps.
The energy of my slide bounding me back to my feet on the back side of the human net that is trying to catch me. Looking back over my shoulder, I gloat, “Muhahahahhaaa! How you like me now?!”
Crunch
It was Chunk or rather Chunk’s thigh. He moved slower than the rest, slow enough that my Spidey Senses didn’t even pick up the threat. I glance at the ball as Chunk bends over with a satisfied grin to pick it up. The display on the ball reads 58 seconds in favor of my team.
***
Later, in the common area of the Shower Tent…”Not bad out there today, T-roy,” Sam said as a genuine compliment.
I was flexing in the polished piece of metal that passes as a mirror here, “Thanks, Sam! I appreciate you picking me.”
Sam takes up a position next to me and starts showing off her arms in the mirror. We had never been obese, as our diets were rationed in a way that kept us within healthy weight ranges, but we had been soft. Even fresh from the water-saving-spongbath-they-call a-shower, my skin had become tough and darkened and was tighter now around my arms and shoulders. I flexed to show a little impressive definition. My dark brown hair had been scorched away to the brazen core of erratic wires that sprouted from my pink and freckled forehead. My teeth also seemed brighter against the contrast of my darkened complexion, though they felt rather less clean than they did under regular at-home maintenance.
“Ooh, shadows from the gains!” I say a bit too loudly and enthusiastically for her Sam.
She rolls her eyes. “Anyways, I don’t think you’ll be picked last anymore,”
I drop my arms and my smile. “Shemmy is gone tomorrow,” I glower.
“Already?”
People come and go from the camp. Its purpose was just a temporary staging ground for commitment and processing, but I had a bond with Shemy, he was cool.
“Do you know when we’re going?” I asked.
“Yeah, it should be in the next few days. Dad had some legal items to get cleaned up. We’re just in a holding pattern until that comes in,” she shared.
“They tell you everything! I’m just treated like a mushroom….left in the dark,” I complain.
“Doofus, they tell both of us. I just actually listen”
I change the subject, “Do you think Mom is ok?”
“She’s getting better. She’s not so angry all the time. I got to talk to her the other day on a walk around camp,” Sam said. “She’s just concerned that we have made a bad decision. We don’t know enough about what life is like in Sub 42, and we have already risked so much to get here. Unnecessarily risked so much, in her mind.”