The Mountain and The City: A Post-Apocalyptic Tale Read online

  Make the Munie regret what it did to her.

  I pull the trigger. My need for revenge is is strong I forget to close my Eyes and become blinded by the burning Light. I can't see but I hear the Light Bullet hit the Munie, and it screams, louder and more terrible than when the small one bit it.

  You don't have much Time.

  I stand blind and go forward, tripping over the Munie thrashing and shouting on the Ground, and I can hear the Water somewhere in front of me. My sight starts to come back in blobs and flashes, shadows on shadow. I see the Stairs to my left, the Munies to my right, and the rushing Water at my Feet.

  This is it. Time to choose.

  The Water is cold like winter and just as strong when I hit. The Night Eyes die on my face, but they show me one last thing before they go: Munie hands. They reach for me hungry and needing. The World goes black as I rush away and under the Wall.

  **

  The Water is strong and I fight to-

  **

  Can't breathe.

  **

  Rushing. Gurgling. Dragging along the Rocks. I feel the Suit rip and can only imagine what the small one is feeling.

  **

  A second of Air, a flash of Light.

  **

  I swallow Water. So cold, it's so-

  **

  Come up for Air. There isn't much room for you. Breathe hard, take as much Air as you can but go under before you hit-

  **

  Can't fight my way up. Fire in my Lungs.

  **

  Colder.

  **

  Slower.

  **

  The Water slows and I know I have one more try left. One more try is all I have.

  **

  I come up again and it's dark. I shout and the sound goes up so the Ceiling must be high. I search for the side and find it but can't climb so I keep my Hands on the Rock waiting for a place to grab, a place for Fingers, and it takes three or four minutes but I find a hold and pull myself up.

  Water has filled the Suit, which makes it heavy, hard to climb. I'm not sure if I can hold on, but I feel the Water coming from the holes so I wait. It hurts me to think of the Suit with holes. I've spent so many Days inside it, taking care of it, protecting it more than anything else, more than even the Trailer. Strange that it doesn't matter now.

  When I'm lighter I come up and onto the Ground, lay on it and breathe in the dark with only the hollow rushing of Water in the Air. I can't even hear my own breath but I know I'm breathing the way my Chest moves and my Lungs burn.

  You can't rest now. Find her first, if she's alive she needs help.

  Careful not to fall into the Water, I stand and call out to her. Whatever Cavern this is it's deep in the Mountain, so tall my Voice doesn't echo. I slip a few times but get back up and keep calling to her.

  When I took the Mask off, I brought the Death to myself. Bastard Air brings either the Death or the Change and I knew that. I took the Mask off to calm the small one, to help her like my Mother helped me. To remember my Mother. I feel a loss of hope in this dark Cavern, but I keep going because nothing has changed. The Death is still coming and the small one still needs me, because that's what life is.

  Under the shout of the Water I hear a sound so small it isn't there, an echo in the quiet. I stop moving. Ignore the Cavern and the Water and the shaking Legs inside the Suit and I listen for the sound, only the sound, tiny and hidden and lost.

  Then I hear it again.

  Coughing.

  **

  On my Knees, my Hands follow the edge of the rushing Water toward the coughing. They come to a place where the Ground goes lower, closer to the Water, and I feel the Water on my Knees but it's calmer, not rushing, a pocket where the Water rests before it goes further into the Mountain.

  My Hands find the small one. She floats in the Water and struggles when I grab her but I calm her like the Water, put my Hand on her head and calm her.

  “Everything is safe. Munies won't follow us, they're scared of the Water, remember? They hate the Water more than anything.”

  I realize what I'm saying and pull her up, bring her to the high Ground away from the Water.

  “Dark,” she croaks.

  “The Mountain is always dark, but don't worry. I have the Night Eyes and I can see everything. I can see you and the Walls and the Water and the Ceiling.”

  The small one doesn't know what Water does to the Night Eyes. She doesn't have to.

  She grabs tight to my Leg and I can feel her shaking.

  “Have you been in Water before today?”

  “No.”

  “Water makes wet and wet makes cold. If you wait enough minutes you'll be back to your nice, Munie warmth.”

  I try to joke, or think I do, but I feel her head shake.

  “No Munie.”

  “I mean warm like the Munies.”

  “No Munie,” she insists.

  “Okay. No Munie. Come, I'll find us a way out of the Mountain.”

  We stay away from the Water and continue through the New Cavern. I pretend to be sure of my steps, pretend to see my Feet to keep the small one calm. When I stumble over Rocks or bump into waxy Spikes I do my best to hide it. We walk until the rushing Water is a whisper behind us, then nothing.

  In pure dark every direction is the same. It might be a mistake to leave the Water but I could hear it stronger further on and I don't want to risk falling in. The Ground was too slippery there, like stepping on Slime Beasts, and a bad step is a very bad step in a place like this.

  We take a passage. It collides with another and we take that. It collides with another and we take that.

  The Ground gets lower under our feet and I hope that's good. At least I know we're not where we've been already, a risk when you can't use Eyes. The Air is so quiet it hurts my Ears. The small one's hand pulls on mine.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “What call,” she asks.

  I don't know what she's saying. She moves my hand to her face, still wet but not as bad.

  She says it again. “What call?”

  “What did I call you? In the Yellow Room, you mean.”

  “And Water.”

  I remember calling for her in the New Cavern. I was using the word again but not realizing it.

  “Child,” I say. “I didn't know what to call you, Munies-” I stop the word. “You don't have a name, do you?”

  She doesn't answer.

  “I'll call you Child if you want.”

  She says it a few times, then: “Want.”

  “Then until you don't, Child is your name.”

  She moves our hands to the Suit, pressing it into my Stomach. “What call?”

  I haven't had a name since the Real Times. It isn't that I don't remember it, but no one has said it since then, and like the other words it died when it wasn't used. Even my own Lips haven't said it since the early Days. To use it is to bring it back from the Death. To make it come up after the fall, like the Munies.

  “Light,” I say.

  “Call Light?”

  “No, look.”

  A room far ahead is filled with strange color. It falls from a Ceiling we can't see to cover the Ground we can, and Child becomes excited and says the word over and over as we go, our feet more sure with each step because we can start to see them, see each other and the Rock around us.

  We come into the room and find the Stars above us. We blink at them with our Mouths open. They're brighter than they've been before, maybe because I missed them. It takes sixteen or seventeen seconds to understand we're not looking at the Stars.

  Small Spikes hang from the Ceiling, not waxy Spikes, clear lines of connected rounds like my Mother wore around her neck. Too many to count. Around them thousands, thousands of Lights, some bright some not, showing us the lines.

  “What call?”

  “I think they're Cavern Beasts, Smaller Winged Beasts. Some use Light to find Supplies. They won't hurt us.”

  We look u
p at them with our Necks bent.

  “Beautiful,” Child says.

  I bend down. “What did you say?”

  “Beautiful.”

  “You know that word? You know what it means?”

  She nods and tries to explain it but doesn't have the words. I'm surprised she knows any. Her face is wrinkled, eyes moving. Then she just points to the Lights and says the word again.

  I stand up straight and look. “I think I understand.”

  I've never met the God, but I know it didn't make this place. It's too far from the Sky for the God to see.

  **

  Even away from the Light Beasts, this part of the New Cavern has Light. It leaks through holes in the Rock, just enough to see the shapes of the Walls. Twenty or twenty-five minutes later we find a room where the Air is hot and wet and smells like Beasts.

  Voices fall from the Ceiling that I recognize, voices of Leatherwings. It's Night and they're awake. When it's dark Out they hunt for Supplies, then come back and hang by their feet. Other than the feet we've always been the same. The Leatherwings don't bother me and I don't bother them, but tonight they might help me.

  “This is good. The Leatherwings will show us the way Out, you'll see.”

  Child doesn't want to come into the room but I pull her along, telling her to watch where her feet go. The Leatherwings make a mess on the Ground where they hang, which brings Small Winged Beasts, which brings other Small Winged Beasts. That's why there are so many small eyes and legs in here, why I pick up Child and move her through.

  The Ceiling above moves with Leatherwings, watching us, opening their mouths and showing us their tiny teeth. The Small Winged Beasts walk up the Suit with their thin legs, exploring with the feelers on their shiny heads. They get into the holes in the Suit and I feel them on my Legs but can't stop.

  At the other side I put Child down and slap at my Legs to kill the Beasts inside. I keep the sound of the Leatherwings over our Heads and follow the mess on the Floor. We walk a long passage that after some minutes brings us to a mouth.

  We step Out from the mouth and into the Air, into the Wood and the Night. The Night is still alive, but not for long.

  **

  I know where we have to go and I don't like it.

  The mouth puts us onto a part of the Mountain I've never had my Feet on. This is good and not good. It looks down at the other side of the City, far from the nest I entered a few hours ago, where the Munies who hunt us have returned by now to sleep until the Day comes, but I don't know this place. Don't know its secrets.

  The nest makes me think of the Axe. I dropped it in the Water where the trains sleep. It makes me sad to think of it drowned. Thinking of the Axe makes me think of the Watch, dead on the Watch Arm, and thinking of the Watch makes me think of the Trailer, and thinking of the Trailer makes me think of the Records, and thinking of all those makes me think how much I miss them.

  This is why thinking isn't good.

  “We have to reach the City before the Sun does. The Cavern is filled with too many Beasts, but it's worse to stay in Open Ground. At least in this part of the City the Munies will only hunt us for Supplies and not for revenge.”

  We start the way down through the Wood. Many of its Trees are dead here and we walk over their dry and fallen arms. The Sky isn't as dark as I want it to be and I don't like breathing Outside. The Tree Beasts scream their familiar scream.

  “The first of the Munies will start to wake soon, we need to find someplace to...” I try to say it how she'll understand. “We need to make a nest of our own, so we can hide until Night comes again.”

  Child barely hears me. She catches a Small Winged Beast out of the Air and then opens her hand to let it go so she can catch it again. Minutes ago she was terrified of Water and dark, and now she runs with floppy arms and legs.

  She doesn't look as dirty as you remember.

  “Are you listening to me? This is important.”

  She aims her pink eyes at me. “No answer.”

  “I'm not asking for an answer.”

  “No answer Child. No answer what call.”

  My Throat feels dry. “You still want to know my name?”

  She nods.

  “But it's not my name anymore, that name is gone with the Real Times. I'm not the same person.”

  She lets the Small Winged Beast fly away.

  “Want call.”

  “There's something you need to understand, Child. When I took the Mask off in the Cavern, I breathed the Bastard Air for the first time. Do you know what the Bastard Air does to a Real Person?”

  She shakes her head.

  “Remember the story about the leaders and the sand. The Real Times were full of Real People, like me, but then the Bastard Air came and brought the Death and the Change to the World.”

  “What death?”

  “The Death is when you get sick, very sick. You fall down and you don't get back up.”

  Without pause she asks, “What change?”

  I hate thinking of it. It's an old memory. A bad one.

  “That's when you fall but you don't get the Death. You get back up. That's where the Munies came from, how the Real Times stopped.”

  “Child not fall.”

  “You were too small to remember. The Munies have babies like all things, like Beasts and Real People, but Munies are born sick. They breathe the Bastard Air when they're still inside the stomach and most of them get the Death, but a few of them get the Change. But it's good that so many of them get the Death, or there would be so many more.”

  Be careful what you say.

  She's silent for eleven seconds. Then: “Change like Child?”

  “I don't know yet. I don't want to know.”

  “What wrong like Child?”

  Yesterday I could answer her, but today I can't. We walk the rest of the way down with the Tree Beasts and foot sounds in the Air, Bastard Air, and the Voice of the Outside as always, whispering to the Mountain.

  **

  Back below the Trailer, where the Wood meets the City, there's a Bridge that keeps the two apart. The one I crossed yesterday to help Child. It made the Mountain and the City two things, next to each other but different. But here, where the Mountain collides with this part of the City, there is no Bridge. The Mountain and the City swirl together into one. The Wood leans into the Buildings and the dirt and leaves creep over the hard Ground until it becomes difficult to tell where the Mountain ends and the City begins.

  I like to know where one thing ends and another begins.

  The Gloves make me itch so I take them off. I see the Watch on the Watch Hand, with hands of its own, not itching, not moving either. This makes the Watch Hand only a Hand. I leave the Watch on my Hand even though it doesn't move.

  We pass cars which have Grass and Flowers on them as thick as in the Wood. Trees grow out of the seats, where Small Beasts have made nests to feed their babies safe from Rain and teeth. The Beasts are smart. Always have been. That's why they got the World back.

  Child sniffs around one of the cars. She pulls herself up to a broken Window and looks inside.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Hungry.” She sniffs some more and decides the nest is abandoned.

  “We don't have Time to find Supplies, the Day is coming.” I point to the end of the Sky where Clouds are wearing color, but she ignores me and keeps sniffing around to the back of the car. She becomes very interested in the pipe there, the place where cars used to breathe, her nose sniffing stronger and deeper and her eyes closed. Then she opens her eyes and pushes her small hand inside the pipe with a fast move and the pipe comes alive with sound, flapping of wings and screaming of voices, and pulls her hand out holding three, small eggs with blue skin and black spots.

  She holds them with her face bright and open.

  “You can eat them on the way.”

  She lifts her hand. “Want?”

  “No want,” I say, and her face closes.

  We wa
lk through the City with our feet as quiet as we can make them, easy on the thick Grass that grows here. The Munies will be waking soon and that makes their sleep easier to stop, their ears more sensitive. I know the Munies as well as anyone can know them, and I know this well. I stopped leaving the Trailer close to the rising of the Sun a year and eight months ago. That was the last time I woke a Munie other than to take its head.

  It's dangerous to go as far into the City as we are, but the Buildings aren't as tall as we need here. Ten Floors. That's the smallest I would hide in, ten Floors but twenty would be better, and I wouldn't sleep anywhere but at the top. The Munies aren't afraid to go that high, not like they're afraid of Water, but they usually won't. Not without a reason. Something about the height bothers them, which is why Munie nests are always on the Ground.

  Which is why I stayed up in the Mountain.

  Movement has me ready to run until I realize it's a group of Beasts. Good ones, Tree Branch Head Beasts. They're making Supplies of Flowers that grow in the middle of the Street, chewing the petals and watching over their shoulders. They usually avoid the City. As we walk around the Beasts, they keep their eyes on Child.

  The Beasts went through their own Change to survive the Munies. I've seen them recognize the difference in moves between a Munie and a Real Person from very far away, a distance even I would have trouble picking out a Munie. I've seen Beasts which normally make Supplies of meat make Supplies of Wood. Some started waking when they used to sleep.