Here’s a short story that I wrote a while ago
Wreckage
Sometimes, I find it hard to breathe. My mind sinks to an abyss and refuses to let me see out of the cloak of darkness that hounds it. I claim this feeling to be the resultant of the few remaining shreds of my sanity trying to keep me bound to the woeful reality that I face, but I know the actual truth. It is the hunger.
The hunger festers inside of me, it drills itself into my bones, wrapping its icy cold hands around my neck and whispers into my ear a word I’ve grown all too familiar with: feed. The need to feed is as great as one’s need to exist, the longer you deny it, the more it reveals itself as an enemy determined to obliterate your existence. The hunger takes hold of my will and bends it towards its own needs. Regardless of how hard I try to fight against it, I am always defeated, and my mind turns into its property.
***
Today is no different from any other day, the heavy grey smoke floats over the broken city like empty sailboats after the crew has been massacred. Disfigured beings walk past, all lost in their own mysterious thoughts. We’re the walking nightmare that nobody thought would never exist.
I’m sitting upon the only patch of grass that remains in the city, it’s dry and black with soot, but I appreciate its presence. My black fingernails dig through the dirt subconsciously, making them dirtier than they already were. I sit in the empty silence of midday in the middle of what had once been a highway, all that remained now was rubble that crumbled under your feet.
My fingers brush against the grey dirt, feeling the grains of sand against my skin, appreciating the contrast of this feeling to that of my hunger. I stare heavily at the heavily dazed beings that walked past me, my hands subconsciously fisting the dried-up grass.
I was scouting. My eyes had become heavily adept at looking through the smoke from the fires, my nose at differentiating the rotten from the fresh, and my legs and mind at being nimble enough to catch my prey. The amount of prey had reduced severely since the last source of meat had been devoured by a crowd at the feeding halls a month ago, a measly sheep, but a sheep nonetheless. Ever since then, the hope of recovering our food source had died and the number of feeders has grown, thus reducing our prey.
My eyes widen as I finally spot one, a child, his hair an unhealthy shade of black, it was grey. My nose twitched, his flesh, it was rotting beneath. He’d die in a matter of days. He walked aimlessly, randomly kicking at objects around him, obviously aware of his inevitable fate. He was cattle awaiting its slaughter, I would be the bullet that took him by surprise. I slowly got up, my eyes stuck on him as if he would disappear if I moved them away. Steadily, like a snake through grass, l got up from the dirt, letting go of a fistful of sand and letting it swivel to the wind. My legs carried me over to him, and I stood behind him, watching him kick away at rocks. After a few seconds, he stopped, noticing my presence behind him and turned around to face me. I stared at his scarred face, his large doe eyes looked up at me helplessly and his tiny hands balled up into fists. “Hello,” he muttered.
“Hi,” I responded. He nodded at me, his grey hair falling into his eyes.
“You’re going to kill me, aren’t you?” he cocked his tiny head to the side, revealing the burnt side of his small neck.
“Why do you say that?” I asked, taken aback but still focused.
He raised an eyebrow at me before shrugging his weak shoulders. “It’s what you do, isn’t it? You take us, and you eat us.” His gaze dropped to the floor and I swear I heard him sniff. I couldn’t think of anything to say, prey was prey, it shouldn’t talk. But this one did, and now I was conflicted and so I stupidly went with my empty gut.
“You’re not going to die,” I muttered. “Not by my hand at least.”
The child looked back up at me with a certain look of disbelief etched onto his broken features. “Wh-”
“Don’t make me change my mind.” I turned around and began walking away with my fist clenched at the loss of a perfectly good meal, but the former meal followed me.
“What are you doing?” I asked, halting and turning around to face him.
“Following you,” he said quite bluntly.
“I know that, but why?”
The child shrugged, a small groan escaped his lips as he did as if it pained him to do so. I looked at him, the ground then back at him, I’d let him follow me he was as good as dead out here anyway.
***
The child and I walked side by side in silence. The only sound between us being the crunching of rocks beneath the soles of our feet. When we became bored with walking around without aim, we sat down side by side on rotting logs. I swung my head back to look up at the grey, smoke-filled sky and let out a shaky breath before closing my eyes and enveloping myself with the darkness that followed.
The child sat beside my shuffling his feet, fingering blades of broken glass, he was bored. I could tell and couldn’t take much more of the scampering noises that he relentlessly made, so I broke the silence.
“How old are you?” I asked, opening my eyes and turning to face him.
He blinked and shook his head. “I don’t remember, nine. I think.”
I nodded my head and leaned back, he should be old enough to remember the final slaughter. “Where are your parents?”
He shrugged and fumbled with his toes. “My mama died a month ago, a hunter shot her near dead alley, and I don’t remember my dad.”
“Dead alley? How-“
He turned around to face me sharply. “Don’t ask, I don’t want to talk about it.” He nodded and his scarred face contorted itself into a small frown.
“I’m sorry,” I muttered. “I just assumed the hunters were dead.”
“They’re not,” he shook his head, “saw one a few days ago, it didn’t do anything though, just stood around and didn’t move. I think he’s still there.”
Hunters were former humans. After the war when animals started going scarce, military officers were forced to take a mutation drug. The drug enabled them to hunt like true predators and find animals for other humans to feed on. Initially it worked, but soon after an additional drug was added to the original and it twisted the dna of these men, writhing them into another wretched species entirely. Instead of hunting for animals they hunted humans and fed on them, their sudden presence on earth stilled any thoughts of recovery. The more they fed, the more their hunger grew, they became the evil beasts that all of mankind feared. The world soon turned into nothing but a hunting ground where everyone was prey.
Camps were created for protection, restricted guns were supplied to the people and a strict five pm curfew was set. As food grew more scarce, and the number of humans decreased, people got angry and thus the war began.
Human against hunter. The loss of life was incredible. Hunters breeded to make feeders. To make people like me.
We aren’t as violent, but we feed just as they did. Or rather, as I’d just found, as they do.
“Take me to him.” I demanded suddenly, turning to face the child with snake like precision. He shook his head, his scars seemed to glisten in the sunlight, his blue veins pulsed on his forehead and red lines threatening to pierce his orbs.
“No.”
I got up from the hot ground and pointed a twisted finger at him. “Yes, you will.”
He frowned, tightening his eyes before attempting to push himself suddenly off the ground. His weak arms faltered beneath him and he collapsed onto the ground, letting out a loud shout at the impact. I took a few steps forward and stood over him. He lifted his head and and a stream of warm blood came steaming out of his nose. The stench of his rotting innards hit me once again and I fought the urge to gag.
“Can you get up?” I asked and he shook his head at me. I held out my hand to him and he took it with shaky fingers, I pulled him up and he winced at the force.
In my mind I recalculated the death date of this child, it was down to a day. I pitied him, yet I still wanted to see the Hunter, my curiosity won over the pity.
“Let’s go.” I muttered. He looked back at me with wide, defeated eyes and nodded solemnly.
***
We walked for an hour or so in silence, the heavy smoke clouds shielded us from the glare of the hot sun and the dry calluses on our feet helped to ignore the sharp sensation of sharp rocks that cracked as we stepped upon them. A heated breeze kept our bodies moist with sweat and the boy’s hair blew wildly around his head like grass in a storm, it covered the scars on his neck but did little to hide the rest.
Alas, we finally reached our destination. We stood in the center of an annihilated park and the boy pointed at something behind a sudden cloud of dust and ash. I craned my neck to see but had to wait for the cloud to pass.
“There he is.” The boy said with his finger still pointing. “The hunter.”
The cloud had passed now and I could see the figure the boy pointed at. It had on a moth beaten hat, it’s shoulders limp and its head bowed to hide its face; within its long limp hands was a rusted shotgun waiting to unload itself into the skulls of innocents. I stared in pure wonder. I was a descendant of its kind. I wouldn’t have realized that I had begun walking towards it if it weren’t for the boy’s suddenly strong grip on my hand pulling me back.
“No.” His fingernails dug ferociously into my wrist. “Please.”
His frightened body visibly shook resembling the frame of a haunted mouse. I nodded down at him and stepped back into my original place as I did so the child let out a blood curdling scream that caused me to stumble and fall onto my backside. I looked up and realised why the child screamed, so much so that I copied it with a scream of my own. The hunter stood before us with his gun aimed at the child, in the few seconds I had been unfocused he’d managed to run up on us with such agility I hadn’t noticed.
In my fear, my eyes remained on the creature and studied him intently. His breathing was as heavy as a broken creaking fan and his body heaved up and down to the tempo. His mouth was opened displaying a black broken array of teeth, and heavy drops of drool fell onto his bare feet creating a puddle on the cracked gravel.
The hunter suddenly jammed his gun onto the child’s chest and he fell to the ground with another scream. At this my senses managed to grab a hold of me once more. I kicked out my left leg and hit the hunter in the shins, his head snapped towards me along with his gun. I turned to the child, hoping that he would see this as a sign and run, but he lay helpless on the ground. His broken body finally caving into his exhaustion, blood pooled out of his nose and he blinked rapidly as if ito help him regain his strength. His fingers curled and uncurled by his side with soft snaps emitting from his knuckles every few seconds...
My attention snapped back to the hunter as he let out a long growl. He’d taken a step closer towards me and now I could smell his stench. I backed up and he took another step towards me, I kicked him once more and this time he reacted. He lunged at me, his heavy body collapsed upon mine and the fight began. His shotgun was pressed firmly across my chest, making suffocation a high possibility. His drool dripped onto my neck and his stench. Oh God the stench, it ripped at my nostrils and clawed its way down my throat into the pits of my stomach. I could feel bile shooting up my throat and when I could no longer hold it back it came out splattering onto the hunter’s face. The hunter screeched in pain as the vile liquid went into his eyes and rolled off of me. I shot up onto my feet, bile dripping down my shirt, and ripped the shotgun from his hands. The hunter continued screeching as I raised the gun above my head and brought it down upon his chest with a loud slam, and proceeded to pull the trigger. He emitted one last howling screech before resolving to eternal silence, I stared down at the body in disbelief, panting heavily as adrenaline shot through my veins.
I turned back to the child as he emitted a soft groan. I dropped the gun and rushed to his side, dropping to my knees, the blood from his nose had dyed his shirt red and his eyes were no longer blinking, his fingers continued in their motion of curling and uncurling. His tiny body seemed so fragile now, his chest heaved up and down his lungs desperate for air. He managed to turn his neck to stare at me with his sad brown orbs, I felt a heavy dropping in my chest as he did this. His body shivered in pain and as his delicate tears streamed down his cheeks, I felt my own tears drop onto my hand. I reached out for his tiny curled hand and wrapped my fingers around his own. I could feel the heat, human heat, fading from his body and watched in empathy as the life seeped out of him.
After he died I sat and stared at his empty eyes, unable to bear their empty glare I closed them gently and rose to my feet. Another day, another life, next it could be my own. The faded reality could collapse now and I wouldn’t even notice because the emptiness within me has eaten up the ability to see what is real. Even now, the child’s body begins to fade from view, but only because I cannot see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there. His presence still lingers, claws into the pathways of my mind and becomes a demon of its own, to haunt me as I walk this empty path alone, forever.
