Kyle West - Apocalypse

Finally, I was drifting off again. I was on the edge of dreams when a guttural scream shook the entire frame of the house, jolting me awake.

Makara’s eyes opened and she shot up from where she had been laying. She reached for her gun, and held it close. She looked at me and held a finger to her mouth.

“Don’t move,” she whispered.

I heard something, something big , scratching on the ground outside. It was barely discernible above the roar of the wind. I heard what I thought were heavy breaths. I hoped it was only the wind.

“It’s one of them,” she said.

“ Here ?”

We lay in the house, quiet. My heart was pounding. I hoped that if I breathed softly, if I didn’t move, it would go away. The storm raged on outside. We waited for what seemed an hour.

We didn’t hear the thing again.

“It is gone,” Makara said.

“What could be that big?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Makara said. “That virus can do weird things – make animals much bigger than they were meant to be. We must be near a Blight. Now, go to sleep.”

I lay down, and closed my eyes. I didn’t know how I could sleep with what she just told me. Yet, despite that scare, I found myself soon drifting off.

The next morning, we woke up late. The storm was over. Still, Makara told me to stay inside while she went to check things out.

A minute later, she came back in.

“There’s nothing out there,” she said. “We lost a lot of time yesterday, but we still might make Oasis by sundown if we hurry.”

We left the house, and traveled all day without seeing another soul. It felt lonesome, out in the Wastes, but given what I’d seen of people out here, I guess that was a good thing.

We avoided the road and struck northeast, through the desert.

“Aren’t there supposed to be cities around here?”

“Yeah, Oasis. Twenty miles.”

“No. I mean, it’s only been thirty years since Meteor, right? You’d think there’d be more buildings around.”

“This area was pretty bare even before that.”

“Still…”

“We’re somewhere north of a city that was called Yucca. There are still signs of it, in some places. You can see buildings, half-buried in the dirt.”

The day was warmer than yesterday, and the clouds were not as thick. They were still red – always red. And of course, there was not a trace of vegetation on the ground.

It seemed to be getting worse the farther we headed north. Smaller, then bigger, dunes rose from the earth. It was tough to climb them. Just seeing those dunes made me feel thirstier and more tired than I already was. We were rationing our water – there would be none until Oasis.

We never stopped, not even once as we plodded north. It no longer felt cold – in fact, I had broken into a light sweat. I was getting used to the work of walking, though there was a constant gnawing at my belly. The promise of a hot meal was all that kept me going.

We passed a few buildings on the way. We passed hills, rocky outcrops, but the day never brightened beyond noon. We were coming up a rise, when on the other side we came to a valley, covered with sand, surrounded in the distance by a ring of low, brown mountains. In the center of the valley I could see low wooden buildings crowded around a small lake. A circular, wooden wall surrounded the whole settlement.

We stopped, and I felt my heart swell with happiness.

“Oasis,” Makara said. “It is good to see you.”

It was thirty minutes before we were standing before the giant wooden gate. Two muscled guards sat in foldout chairs in the watchtower connected to it. Each had a rifle propped next to him. They scowled as we stopped before the entrance.

“Not looking good, Makara…”

“Quiet. You’re making me nervous.”

Neither of the guards said a word. One was tall and black, and chewed on a cigar, letting the ash fall to his feet. The other was tan with cropped, blond hair. They stared down at Makara and me from their perch like vultures eyeing their next meal.

We stood there a while, Makara never breaking her gaze from the men after mine had long fallen to the sand.

Finally, the black guard spoke. “What do you want with us, raider? You know you and your ilk are unwelcome within these walls.”

“I am not a raider,” Makara said, her voice level. Her calm voice carried as well as a shout would. “Just a traveler, seeking a place to rest.”

“Humph.” The guard smirked. “A likely story. Then the caravan leader, who now rests safely within our walls, must be lying. He saw you with the raiders yesterday. They made off with quite a bit of loot. I’m surprised your share wasn’t great enough for you to come begging here.”

“We oughta shoot you on sight,” the blond guard drawled.

The black guard smirked at that. I was ready to turn around. But Makara stood her ground.

“Let me speak to Elder Ohlan.”

The black guard’s eyes narrowed. “Elder Ohlan need not speak with scum such as you. I suggest you turn back. Now. Before I put a bullet in your chest.”

“Ohlan knows me. And I knew Raine. I am Makara of the Lost Angels.”

The guards exchanged curious looks. The blond guard nodded, and the black guard turned to speak to Makara.

“Those are not light words you speak, Angel,” the black guard said, adding a note of skepticism to that word. “Many would claim allegiance with the Angels. What proof do you have?”

“This,” Makara said, lifting her sleeve.

The blond guard fiddled with something behind him. A spotlight clicked on, sending a beam of bright light onto us. I held my hand to my eyes. Then, the light clicked off.

“Well enough, traveler,” the black guard said. “If that work is false, then it is well done. I will tell Ohlan you are here. I will return when I have an answer.”

The black guard left, while the other one stood watching, holding his gun and looking ready to use it.

“Don’t say a word,” Makara said softly. “With luck, Ohlan will remember me. The Lost Angels are still spoken highly of in the Wastes.”

“Why are they so well-known?”

“Raine. He was not like the other gang lords. He was good. He helped people. He even helped build Oasis’s walls. He’s the reason the raiders don’t own everything up to the border of L.A..”

We stood in front of the gate for a while. The blond guard stood like a statue, paying no heed to our conversation.

“How do you know Ohlan, anyway?”

“I guess I forgot to tell you that part,” Makara said. “Ohlan is Raine’s brother.”

We waited a long time. With the night, came the chill, and it wasn’t long before I was shivering. Makara gave a small hiss. I stopped.

Finally, the black guard came back

“You are to come in,” he said. “Elder Ohlan wishes to speak with you.”

The gate started to move. It creaked, rolling back inch by inch.

“First, you must surrender your weapons to me. They will be returned upon leaving.”

Makara did so. I noticed, after giving up her first gun, she gave up another one from her pack.

“You’ve had two ? This whole time?”

She looked me up and down, and shrugged. “What of it?”

“I could use one, you know.”

“Maybe in time,” she said. “I’m sure about you, now.”

I didn’t understand why she kept it from me. Did she not trust me after all we’d been through?

The guard led us through Oasis’s main drag. I’d never seen anything like it in my life. Buildings of sheet metal and wood, sometimes both, lined both sides of the street. From the sides people watched us, more people than I’d ever seen since leaving the underground. They were dressed in tattered, faded pants, colorless shirts, rarely of one piece, sewn together from a variety of different sources.