Kyle West - Apocalypse

“I was watching the sunset from the rooftop when the streets came alive. Hundreds of Black Reapers surrounded the tower. You ran to the roof, screaming for me. You told me Raine was dead, and that we had to leave. You ended up staying, however.” She sighed. “I still haven’t forgiven you for that.

“You pushed me out the back door, with a pack and a gun. Then, a few mortars flew through the air, whistling as they passed. The explosions rocked everything, and all I saw was darkness and fire. Acrid smoke filled my lungs, stung my eyes, choked my breath. My hearing faded, and then there was nothing – I felt nothing, saw nothing, knew nothing as the rubble crashed down.”

She said nothing for a while. Samuel and I waited for her to go on.

“The entire building was a ruin behind me. It was only as the gunshots faded, as the Reapers’ bikes tore through the streets and surrounded the building, that I ran. I ran as far as I could, though I had nowhere to run to. I ran east through the streets, through decaying buildings, through toppled fences and broken walls. I looked back, and the tower was gone in a smoking ruin, along with my entire life. I thought you had died.

“I wandered for weeks. Some nights I found food. Some nights I didn’t. Winter was coming.

“It was the next day when I fell in with a group of raiders. At first, one of the men wanted to use me and keep me as his. But I shot him. I didn’t care what they did to me. The leader – a man named Char – smiled. He fed me, and put clothes on my back.

“I was in.

“We raided all through autumn. We killed, we stole, and the men did worse. But never once would they touch me. I was one of them.

“I was aware that I was becoming less and less of a person. But I felt less than nothing. By October, we headed west out of the valley along I-10, into the Mojave. We traveled for weeks, until we reached Raider Bluff. I had never seen anything like it. The city is huge, built on a giant, three-tiered mesa. The city has three levels, including the fortified Alpha’s Compound at the top. We came, laden with camels of goods. We were treated like kings. I allowed myself a smile, then. With my share of the loot, I was able to trade for guns, for food, for clothes, and batts. It was all mine.

“Everyone in town wanted to know who I was – the woman raider. The women in Raider Bluff are little more than slaves for the men. There are exceptions – like my friend Lisa, who runs a bar called the Bounty, who I became friends with. When winter came on, I hardly stepped outside from that place. It was cold, but I stayed in there, where I rented a room. I drank much. I hardly remember the winter of 2058.

“When the storms ended, raid leaders searched for new recruits. Dozens approached me, but I turned them all down. I intended to stay there and drink myself to death.

“And then, I realized my batts were running thin. Without the batts, I could not eat, and more importantly, I could not drink. I decided to continue living. I don’t know why. I didn’t have anyone. Everyone in my family was dead. I knew nothing of friendship.

“I entered onto a raid with the next leader who approached me. His name was Brux.”

Makara paused to drink from a glass of water. She looked at me, and gave a tired smile.

“Brux was especially cruel, even for a raider. His specialty was slaves. Women, mostly. I did not know this at the time. Lisa warned me against him, but I did not care. I knew he brought back the loot, and I wanted that.

“That year, I saw the most terrible things. I will not repeat them here. I felt myself die more and more each passing day. I was afforded no respect among the raid group, and the only way I could get it was by killing one of them who tried to rape me. Finally, they learned, and kept away from me. Many times, I flew into rages and threatened to take my share back to Bluff. Brux would not hear of it.

“I became aware of it, slowly. Brux would watch me on those cold nights, when he thought I was sleeping. Countless times he tried to have his way with me. I learned to both sleep and be aware of the danger. But he never let me be, no matter what I tried. I could not kill him – that would be mutiny, a crime punishable by crucifixion. I had seen a death like that, in the winter. The crows had feasted well all the next day.

“I thought the year would never end. It was a good year, though, if good could be used as a word. Twenty slaves, one hundred camels, and plenty of loot. I collected four times the batts with Brux than I did under Char.

“How could I do this, you ask? I don’t know. I had no conscience, then. I didn’t care about anything.”

Makara had stopped talking. Samuel had become distant – grieved, in a way. I felt like I had to say something, to make her go on.

“What caused you to care?” I asked.

“That did not happen until the next season. There are two seasons in Raider Bluff – winter, and summer. In the summer, you raid. In the winter, you hide inside and try not to freeze to death. That winter, the end of 2059, I told Lisa I was done. But I could not be done. We both knew this. Raiding, once chosen, can never be abandoned. One, because no settlement will take you. And two, once abandoned, even raiders won’t have you. You either raid, or you starved. It is that simple.

“And there was something else I did not know. Brux had marked me. It was believed, however falsely, that I was his woman. The other raid leaders were afraid of him, so they did not ask me to raid with them next season. There was nothing but to go with Brux again that summer.

“When we left Bluff, things went well at first. And then – misfortune upon misfortune. A sandstorm killed two men and buried the first two months of loot. We spent days trying to dig it up, but we had lost it. After that, everything was lean.”

“Lean?” I asked.

“Had been picked over already. No loot.” She sighed. “We trekked north, far from normal raiding territory. For miles and miles we walked, until we reached the Ice Lands. Though it was summer, the nights were deathly cold. But Brux was a risk-taker – he thought there would be people here, or at the least, cities that had not yet been looted. We were trying to find one – called Portland, but we became lost in a Blight.

“This was my first Blight to see on the West Coast. The trees were twisted and turned. I had seen nothing like it since my original home – Bunker One. One night, we were attacked by a pack of monsters. We killed them, but at great cost. What men did not die in the attack froze or starved on our journey back to southern lands. Somehow, we found our way back – just six of us, out of an original twelve.

“In southern lands again, we found food, but little else. Whatever we raided became lost, or went straight to Brux.

“We were on I-10, along the caravan routes, hoping for a lucky train that another raid hadn’t yet gotten. But instead, we came upon a sick man – a government man, because he wore a Bunker 114 uniform.

“Brux stabbed him, and we dragged him off the road and left him for dead. Little did we know that we were so close to Bunker 108. That Bunker ended up taking him in, and that man spread the Blight sickness to everyone there.”

“Wait,” Samuel said. “Bunker 108 is gone, too?”

I nodded. “It is. I am the only survivor.”

Samuel looked at me with pity. I tried to ignore that.

“So, going there is no longer an option,” Samuel said. “I had hoped to learn more from a certain Dr. Keener. Did you know him?”

A flood of emotion overwhelmed me when I heard that name. “He was my dad,” I said.

Samuel’s eyes widened. “Really? I am deeply sorry. He was a scientist, wasn’t he? He studied the xenovirus.”