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“Don’t think I won’t…”
“I’m counting on it. But you think they won’t hear the shot? I heard at least six different transports — horses and engines with them. You might not be an Omega, but I am,” I hiss that terrifying truth. I watch her face change, first into melting wax before it rapidly solidifies into a horrified grimace. “What do you think’s gonna happen if you shoot one of the last Omegas left? What do you think they’ll do to you when they find the body?”
Thebody. Notmybody. Because I’m not willing to die just yet. Willing might be a stretch, butready. I’m not ready to give up, not unless they catch me. I know what happens if I’m caught though, the kind of life that awaits me.Trapped.If it comes down to it, I’ll be ready if they catch me.
“Fuck. Come in quick. But don’t you tell anybody and you get out as soon as the war party clears. And don’t even think about scavenging the bodies — those are ours. You got me?”
“Yeah, I got you,” I say, shoving inside and pulling my mask back up to cover my nose. I wouldn’t go near an Alpha with a thousand-foot pole, not even a corpse, no matter how good the loot might be.
She closes the door behind me, leaving the two of us caged together in a small room awash in blinding blue light. A ramp — also made out of metal-plated trash — descends into the bowels of Trash City where roads and roads of trash form the dirty Beta underworld, forgotten by Alphas in their towering cities.
We wind through streets made of tin and cardboard and compressed plastic, passing marketplaces with stalls selling all kinds of junk that I’d kill to barter for, but can’t. I spy rags that pass for clothing, the occasional fur, all kinds of herbal concoctions their sellers boast contain medicinal, if not magical, properties, food — evenbread— and…is that soap?Fuuuuuuuuck. My feet stutter before the tip of my guide’s gun presses against my spine.
“Keep moving,beautiful,” she sneers the insult.
I wish it didn’t hurt, but it does. It’s just a reminder of my place here and how short my lifespan’s likely going to be all because of some stupid genetic marker. “Fuck you.”
“Ha.” She lunges forward and snatches up a swatch of my hair. She holds me still and leans forward, her cheek brushing mine… “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“Your breath stinks worse than I do,” I snap back.
She shoves me forward and I fall, tripping into a group of people haggling over what look like towels — actual towels — who shove me back upright with hisses and angry grunts. Turning from them, I follow the path down, down, down, turning left at a place that’d be a stretch to call a bar and then right again when the dormitories start.
The dormitories are actually just plastic and trash-cobbled walls. There aren’t any doors, but that doesn’t matter. The fact that there are walls at all is more privacy than anyone living in a compound would get. She guides me to an empty stall and I stand in the center of it. There’s nothing on the floor that I could cobble together into a bed, but that’s okay. It’s clean. For trash.
“You gonna watch me all night? I promise, I don’t make for a good show.”
She snorts. “Nah. I’m waiting for those boots.”
I tense and think about begging, but don’t. Instead, I sit down, pull out the last of the rabbit I got and yank off my boots. She whistles when I toss them up to her one at a time. “Damn. These are actually good boots. Scuffed to shit, but the soles are still attached to the leather.” She smells them. “Shit smells real, too. Where’d you get ‘em?”
I hesitate, then tell her, “Prayersville.”
Her smug smile falls just a little and she looks at the rabbit skin I pass up to her. “How long ago?”
“Six weeks. Take or leave a week or two.”
“Fuck. That long ago?”
I nod. “Yeah.”
“And you’ve made it this far?”
I nod again.
“Shit.”
“Yeah. Here. Take it.” I thrust the rabbit up at her again.
“Nah.” She shakes her head and shoves her goggles up onto her forehead. “Keep it.” She hesitates, fidgeting with the shoes she’s got looped over one shoulder. I try not to look at them. The loss already stings. I flex my toes in my thick socks, grateful for them now more than ever.
“Sorry,” she offers with a shrug, but it sounds likeI’m sorry for your loss.And that loss? My own life. I just haven’t realized it yet.
I don’t say anything. Just keep rifling through my bag, trying to find my space blanket. A high-value item, I had to trade six rabbits for it and I’m sure it’ll be the next thing that goes.
“I’m Merlin.”
I nod, unsure of what to say… My gut instinct is just to keep quiet and tell her to shove off, but it’s been so long since the last time I introduced myself to anyone, I’m compelled to tell her, “Echo.”
