T Southwell - Prophecy

Rayne considered finding a less well-guarded store, but the prospect of continuing her dangerous journey on an empty stomach did not appeal to her. Like most food stores, it was an old shop with all the doors save one bricked up. In the early days, raiders had used explosives to blow open food store doors, and some autocrats had given up repairing the damage. This store was one that possessed no doors, its owner having opted to use more guards instead.

This meant that raiders were sometimes killed, which pleased the autocrats. The rivalry between store guards and raiders had become something of a deadly game, which was why guards did not merely stand outside the doors, or wait inside in ambush. To even the odds, they patrolled in front of the store, giving raiders a chance to get in if they had the guts to try.

Watching them, she noticed that there was about a minute when both pairs had their backs to the door. This gave her a slim chance, but it was risky. If they caught her, they would give her to an autocrat, a prospect grim enough to make her hesitate. Then her stomach rumbled, reminding her of why she was there.

Rayne waited for the right moment, missing two before she plucked up enough courage to make her dash. Leaving the safety of the doorway, she sprinted across the road and ghosted through the door. She held her breath as she waited for the shouts and the pounding of feet that would tell her that she was now trapped. Her heart's hammering was the only sound in the vast, dilapidated room, however, and she turned to survey her surroundings.

Mountains of boxes were stacked against the walls, and she went to tear open the nearest cardboard lid and look inside. Plastic-wrapped food bars, nutritious but, in this case, tasteless. She gathered some, then looked in another box, finding tinned stuff, too heavy to carry. A third box yielded protein and vitamin pills, and she filled her pockets with these and more food bars of different flavours and nutritional values.

Once she had as much as she could carry, she returned to the door. It was dangerous to stay inside too long, since the guards sometimes checked for intruders. She peered out and jerked back. The guards faced the door, and she waited, then looked again just as they turned away.

With her heart lodged in her throat, she sprinted for the doorway she had hidden in earlier. Shouts rang out behind her, followed by the clatter of running feet, and she veered off. Clutching her stolen booty, she raced down the street, the guards pounding in pursuit. She lengthened her strides, her muscles stretching, her hair flying like a banner. For a while, she revelled in her speed, but all too soon the burning of fatigue invaded her legs. Sprinting required a great deal of effort, and was not something that she could sustain for too long, especially while carrying an armload of food.

Scarcely a block passed before the extra weight and her weakened condition took their toll. The guards kept up, their wild shots ricocheting off the walls on either side of her, alarmingly close. They did not seem to be aiming to kill, only to frighten her, for now. She dived into an alley, hoping to lose them in the shadows and garbage, but they were too close, and followed.

The men stopped firing and whooped with triumph as they closed with their quarry, certain of their success. Dropping the food, she sprinted again, intent only on escape. Her legs were lumps of burning lead and her lungs seemed to have shrunk. The guards gained, and she leapt over a pile of old cardboard and stumbled, sobbing with terror and exhaustion. The alley ended a few metres further on in a high wall. She slowed, her mind numb with horror, unwilling to look back at her triumphant pursuers.

A golden light appeared in the dingy alley ahead, forming a nimbus that brightened to blinding intensity, forcing her to squint and avert her eyes. She stumbled to a halt, panting. The light vanished, and a man, clad mostly in black, with a grey, knee-length coat, stood there. She gaped at him. Although he remained immobile, in this hostile place she could only assume he was an enemy. His appearance from the golden light made her wonder if he was another alien, or if the autocrats had discovered this odd mode of travel.

If he was an alien, Earth was becoming rife with them. His appearance did not change her situation, however. The guards would reach her momentarily. Letting her aching legs fold, she sank down gasping and waited for the guards' rough hands to drag her to her feet. Instead, the unmistakable hum of a laser bolt blazed over her, filling the alley with shimmering blue light. Shouts came from behind her, and she glanced back. Two guards lay still on the ground. Another brilliant beam crisped the air overhead, and a third man collapsed with a strangled cry. The last guard tried to aim his weapon as yet another vicious buzz and flash of blue light passed over her. He crumpled with a hoarse cough, and a tense silence fell.

Rayne stared at the sprawled bodies, hardly daring to breathe, then turned to face the man who had killed them. He stood there still, his grey coat flaring in the breeze that stirred scraps of paper and made them dance along the grimy tar. He holstered his laser, the soft click loud in the stillness.

Rayne stared at him with deep trepidation. If he came after her, she did not have the strength to run. He was too far away for her to make out any details, and the gloom made him little more than a shadow. His black clothes did not have the cheap shine of an autocrat's garments, nor did he act like a raider.

Considering the startling way in which he had arrived, she did not think he was either. His strange method of travel and odd inaction mystified her. She was usually good at sensing people's moods, but he appeared neither impatient nor hesitant; he seemed to merely study her. He glanced up, and she glimpsed the alien profile of what appeared to be a black mask, then golden light engulfed him, forcing her to avert her eyes. When she looked again, he had vanished.

Scrambling to her feet, she glanced around with deep suspicion, but only papers scuttled past in the breeze. She took a moment to recover from the shock while her heart slowed and her breathing became less painful, swallowing to ease her throat's dry rawness. Then she headed back up the alley and collected the guards' weapons before stepping over the bodies to pick up her food.

A few blocks away, she sat down to eat, glancing around with fearful, hunted eyes. These mysterious beings or people who appeared and vanished were becoming unnerving, and, even though they had helped her twice, she wished they would leave her alone. Perhaps they would when she found Rawn. When strength returned to her limbs, she set off once more in search of her brother, hoping she found him before hunger forced her to raid another food store.

Rawn woke shivering and crawled out of the musty blankets to sit in the sun's feeble warmth. He cursed the many abuses this cruel world heaped upon his head daily, adding one more to the list. Now he was not only hungry, dirty, cold and weary, but lonely as well. He watched a group of vagrants trying to catch a rat in the filth. The mutated rodents were the size of rabbits, but still slim pickings for four people. Three ragged, skinny men and a woman, brown with dirt, chased the rat with starved desperation. The woman gave a thin cackle of delight as she caught it, which turned into a squeal of pain when it bit her. She dropped it, and the men groaned in despair as it dived into a storm drain. One cuffed her, growling something unintelligible.

Rawn's lips twisted in disgust as he looked away. It turned his stomach to watch them. They were human, or at least they used to be; now they were worse than animals. Would he end up like them when the food stores emptied? The group shuffled off down the street, kicking the piles of rubbish heaped against the walls in search of another rat. A sudden urge to quit the city took hold of him, and he jumped up. He would go to the meeting place. Rayne was bound to go there eventually, if she was not already there, waiting for him. Either that or the autocrats had captured her, in which case he would never see her again. He set off at a run.