Sproggo - Son of Max

Chapter 1. i

Sproggo was dreaming. Sproggo always dreamt. Not always the same dream, some were the normal random variety, but most were about his childhood. He often dreamt of growing up under the caring eye of Aunt May. Aunt May called him her little miracle, having been pronounced dead as a young child and spending two days on a trolley in a hospital corridor due to hospital backlogs. An overworked mortician eventually came to take the body to the morgue and happened to notice a tiny movement under the sheet. Sproggo was alive, and embarrassed hospital staff done everything they could to keep him that way. By the time the mistake was realized, Sproggo's mum was dead, and his father had disappeared into the wasteland, so he was released into the care of Aunt May. He had a father figure in old Clem, the Army veteran who had the farm next door. Clem had taken it upon himself to teach Sproggo all the tricks he had learnt in some place called 'Nam. He dreamt of the times they had hid for days in the tunnels and bolt holes Clem had made while the bikers trashed the farms and scavenged for supplies, most of which had already been hidden away. He dreamt of the first time he had seen Clem cry, burying his only child, Bobbo, a gentle giant who became Sproggo's first friend. The second time he cried was when they were burying Aunt May after she didn't wake up one day. Clem had then cried for days until Sproggo found his body lying next to Aunt May's grave. His dreams reminded him of the day he loaded up on supplies and left the farm to search for his father, whom Aunt May always said was out there somewhere because he was too tough to die. But this was one of his regular dreams, and the one he hated the most. It was about the death of his mother, and the day his father had disappeared. He was always surprised how vivid this particular dream was, seeing as he was only a baby when it happened, his subconscious mind drawing the pictures and colouring the images from the stories his Aunt had told him about his parents during the years she had reared him on the farm. He saw the dream from lots of different vantage points, but the result was always the same. His mother carrying him, trying to outrun the beasts on bikes. Doing what she could to save her child, and using her body to cushion his tiny frame from the iron steeds stamping out her life. And her whimpering as her life left her..........

Sproggo's eye's snapped open. The dream stopped. The whimpering continued. A shot of adrenalin fired him up. He quickly surveyed his surrounds. His roof top home seemed safe. Reddog, only a pup when Sproggo found him dying in the gutter 18 months or so ago, was standing at the edge of the building looking at something on the street below. It was his whimpering that had woken Sproggo. He joined his dog at the edge. The street below was littered with the flotsam and jetsam of a society that had long ago forgotten what it meant to be a society. Smashed cars, rubbish, cement blocks, buildings wrecked, ravaged, and scavenged. Sproggo saw immediately what red dog had been trying to tell him about. Below Sproggo could see three people, two males, one lucky to be a teenager, and a woman, picking their way through the mess below. They were dressed in combat gear common to the wharf tribe of the cities east. Sproggo had traded with the Wharfies in the past, and had more respect for them then for some of the other tribes in the city. It surprised Sproggo that they were travelling in only such a small group so far out of their territory, and so close to sundown. Nighttime was the territory of the Gutter Kids, and the only time you dealt with them was to fight for your life. What surprised him even more was the three didn't notice the half dozen Scavengers stalking them. Sproggo had steered clear of linking himself to any of the tribes in this city wasteland. He had been taught to look after himself and didn't need the safety of numbers, but he had quickly learnt some were better than others. The Scavengers were scum. They were the cockroaches of the city, attacking others in numbers and dragging back their bounties to their masters, the Bikers, for the drugs they supplied. Above all, Sproggo hated Bikers.

: