Runner

Chapter Two

I looked back towards the township, through a narrow gully I could see a cloud of orange chaos. This wasn’t a typical raid, it wasn’t an inspection for prohibited memorabilia. This was a hunt, they’d tracked us, and we both knew it. The seekers had been hot on our tail for months. Collective eight was our last refuge. One of few places where our enemies were few, and our pseudonyms as humans were still intact.

“We need to go, now,” Elek said, the thick sound of burning timber, and the onslaught of smoke suffocating the silent night.

If they were here, then the asylum we’d hoped for was impossible. We did need to leave. It was a very real possibility that after we left, we’d never be able to return. A return would be too risky, our arrival, the raid, and our following disappearance, were too convenient. 

I turned back to my older brother, his short hair dark, his athletic body reflecting the gruelling lifestyle we lived. HE read the plea in my face.

“No,” he threatened, as he stepped back, raising his finger towards me.

Elek knew what I wanted. There was one more thing I needed from this place. One more reason I’d wanted to come here.

“No, don’t you dare,” he begged.

I began my descent down the hill, “You know you can’t talk me out of this Elek.”

He snatched me back by the shoulder, “I won’t lose you too.”

I didn’t have a response to that. I knew it was reckless, but I needed this small thing more than I needed life. I was willing to risk it all.

He stampeded behind me, following me down, “You’re going to get yourself killed….She doesn’t deserve this from you.”

“Savour what you can from our place, I’ll rendezvous with you within the hour,” I promised, ignoring his patronizing tone.

“Don’t keep me waiting,” He grumbled under his breath, kicking a tree stump. He’d always had a bad temper.

“Don’t keep me waiting,” I retorted, as I trudged through the knee-high grass.

“Is that a challenge?”

“For me? No.”

 **

It was hell on earth. When I reached the township again, everything had been turned inside-out. Fires lit the night a demonic orange, the air weaved with black smoke. Families were scattering, panic was registering, people turning on their own.

Raiders used their batons and guns, no mercy, blood staining the streets. Homes were destroyed, the little belongings people did have, shattered, ruined and crushed, collecting across the roads.

And the noise, like the cries of dying angels.

It was in times like these that I would do anything to forfeit my heightened senses.

I ran through the chaos, ignoring the tortured looks on the faces of people who did not deserve such treatment, ignoring screams of children. When I reached the alleyway that lead to the collective entrance, it was spread with gang members.

This time they fought off raiders, the smoke made it hard for them to see much, most tied up in one-on-ones. Bloodied bodies decorated the gutter and sidewalk while they continued in aimless war, oblivious to my presence.

I slipped into the tunnels, again, now lit with florescent emergency lights a ringing alarm sounding in the background.

The collective’s remained mostly untouched during Raids. They were human enterprises, most of which dedicated a fair amount of resources to hunting and turning over people like me, hence they were allowed to slide under the radar.