Michael Soll - Scorched

“All that matters is the last.”

“I have a favor you owe me—”

“No, you cannot ask that. We are doing this, with or without you.”

He stood up and looked down on me, but I wasn’t intimidated by his size. I could take him to the ground if I chose. I could end him if I decided. All he could do was convince me otherwise. I was the one with the power.

“For my favor… I want you to promise you won’t harm Kaolin. She’s been taken and had nothing to do with any of this. I want to free her.”

“Fine. But you need to tell us everything you know about the city. You will help us construct a model of their village, and then you will bear witness to its destruction.”

He didn’t seem pleased by my words, but there was very little he could do. “Okay,” he said quietly, as if the volume of his response would make him less complicit in Newbury’s demise.

With Spec’s help, we were able to create a model of the city. It was much larger than we had all thought, and there were a few buildings my father either had not mentioned or had been built recently.

I stood amongst the Council of Warriors as we gazed upon the city. My father’s name had given me a great deal of respect, but I had also earned much on my own as one of the best scavengers in the tribe. Still, I was not the strongest or fiercest warrior. People listened when I spoke, but my words were not necessarily the wisest. The city was led by the Council which I was a part of. There were 15 of us, with each member being chosen by the others. But, with two dying in the Bung attack, we were now down to 13.

Ludvik was the only warrior larger and fiercer than Gunnar. Ten enemies were not enough to take him down. Harva was the wisest and greatest tactician in the Council. She studied the model and spoke softly, as she always did, as she only could:

“They’ll be securing their borders, waiting for an attack. If one of us is spotted, all of us are spotted. They will expect us to come from the East which means they will be expecting us to come from the West. There’s no way to breach from the North which only leaves the South. That is where the fewest safeguards will be and where we will infiltrate the city.”

She moved her foot over to the East side of the city where the water device was located.

“This contraption gives the city light. The water flows through, spinning the object, allowing their city to live. Deactivate the device and you deactivate their city.”

Gunnar circled the structure with his spike. “So we destroy the structure and breach from the South.”

Ludvik stepped forward. “We go in from the East. It doesn’t matter if they know we’re coming. They can do nothing.”

“We’re stronger, but there are too many of them,” warned Harva. “Even with the power disrupted, a trap would end us. We need to wound them before we attack. We need to take a substantial amount of them out before we set foot in their city.”

Harva circled the body of water that led toward the “water mill.” It was the body of water Cotta told me he had swum in some time ago, the same body of water that led them to Newbury.

“We attack this first. We attack their sustenance. Poison their drinking water. It will kill many of them, debilitate several others.”

Spec looked uneasy, but there was nothing he could do. I told him I would leave Kaolin unharmed, and I would in the battle… if she survived until then.

“We’ll take the uneaten bodies. Secure them in the water. The blood of our fallen will spoil their living. We’ll wait a few days and then disrupt the contraption and attack from the South.”

Ludvik seemed irritated by the strategy. He didn’t like the idea of sneaking up or planning. He wanted to smash ahead and destroy anything in his path. He was an unstoppable force and unstoppable forces don’t ever worry about barriers because barriers did not exist. He got what he wanted because nobody could stop him. You could disagree, you could explain why he was wrong and that he was wrong, but it did not matter. He would not listen because he did not have to. He would ignore your words and live in his ignorance. He would believe he was right and shut out those who disagreed, and thus he was right. As long as he focused on his own thoughts and purged all others, those were the only thoughts. In his world, whatever he believed was truth and since he was so strong, nobody could penetrate. He could take you down before you could make him believe he was wrong. Before you could shatter his world, he would shatter you.

“I’ll plant the bodies,” Gunnar declared.

I scanned the Council, trying to decipher their thoughts. Gunnar was a great warrior, but he could not be trusted alone with something so important. Harva could volunteer to go with him, but she was too important a strategist were something to happen.

“I’ll go with him.” The Council looked my way, considering if it was such a smart idea to send the tribe’s symbolic leader on a potentially dangerous journey. They could send several warriors with us, but the more people traversing stealthily through the tunnels, the more chatter and the more chance of getting caught, especially while dragging bodies.

Harva nodded. “Valasca will go with Gunnar along with Beadurinc and Eyvindur. Take a body each. We’ll wait until they have properly rotted and then you shall go on your journey.”

The Council ended and I was left alone in my hut with only my thoughts and memories of a time when I wasn’t alone. I looked over at the empty shell of my Cotta, lying next to me, hollowed. Even though he rested beside and inside of me, I knew he was gone. I knew I was truly alone.

As every day passed and more memories were formed in my mind, those of my Cotta were regrettably purged. I would soon forget his touch and his breath. I would soon forget his spirit and his laugh. And as more time passed, my wounds would slowly heal, not because I would miss him any less, but because I would forget how he was, how we were. Time does not remove the scars, it merely plasters new skin above the lesion. The wounds became less visible, but you know they’re there. They were always there. Lingering and festering until one’s own breath ceased, until one’s own world ended. And someday, my world would end. Some day, Harva and Gunnar and even Ludvik’s world would end.

That’s the thing about unstoppable forces. They keep moving and destroying until at some point, there’s nothing left to conquer. And when there’s nothing left to bombard, there’s no such thing as an unstoppable force. Because, if there are no objects to attempt to block the force, it can no longer be deemed unstoppable.

And then, all you’re left with is nothing.

Sabotage was the smart choice. The Bungs had always underestimated us. They viewed us as brutes and brutes did not use their brains. They were Ludviks, smashing forward and plundering ahead. Newbury would never expect sabotage because they did not believe we were capable of it.

You should never underestimate your foe. Doing so says less about them and more about you. It speaks volumes about ones own prejudices.

Beadurinc, Eyvindur, Gunnar and I collected four uneaten bodies. We plucked the hair from their head and formed twine, tying their bodies together, and latching them to Gunnar’s waist and he would drag them through the tunnels.

Eyvindur took the lead since he was the greatest tunneler of the group. I was behind, followed by Gunnar and then Beadurinc, bringing up the rear and helping push the bodies. The corpses’ loose flesh would often snag against the rocks, leaving a residual trail of their entrails, a stain which he would quickly smother with dirt to prevent anyone from tracking us.