The Charred Lands: City of Ash Page 9

  “Azaria?” I almost screamed as I frantically checked behind all the bare shelves of the stockroom – she was gone.

  The door at the back of the room hung wide open, the crates that had previously been blocking it lay scattered across the floor – smashed glass from the empty bottles inside covered the floor.

  I charged through the back door and into the dark, dingy alley outside.

  “Azaria!” I yelled at the top of my lungs – nobody replied. She was gone.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I didn’t know what to do – I felt so alone. This wasn’t the first time that I had felt this way, but it was by far the worst. In comparison, being alone in the middle of a woodland road was nothing in comparison to this. Still, I was at the foot of the city yet already it had shown me a taster of things to come – like it was teasing me, testing my will - as though it purposely placed the Fider and the men and made me watch the power and the horrors that the city had at its disposal as some kind of warning.

  Azaria was gone. I didn’t know if she ran away from me, ran for her life, or was taken – but she was gone. I couldn’t tell if the shattered glass and scattered crates were signs of a struggle, or of a rush. It didn’t make sense – leaving me made no sense. I understood that she was angry, but she didn’t even take any of the supplies. She was out there, all by herself with no weapons or supplies. I couldn’t even begin to consider what she would do next – assuming she left of her own free will. I couldn’t imagine her lasting long in the city. I understood that she may have felt the need to get away from me, after what happened with Wayne, but this was drastic to say the least.

  I sat there, in the stockroom for a while, half planning my next move, half hoping she would return. What felt like two hours passed by at an excruciatingly slow pace without sign of the girl. Finally, I stood from the crate which had proven to be a rather uncomfortable chair for the last couple of hours and made my way back outside, through the front of the store. Once again, I felt like a child standing at the feet of a giant, preparing for a duel. My mission seemed ever more difficult than it previously had. Though Azaria was no battled hardened warrior, she was human – she was a decent person. She gave me the moral, and mental support that I so desperately needed out here.

  I stared down the long, wide road that seemed to stretch for miles into the city, at this moment, the area seemed clear, so I quickly devised a plan. I would simply walk straight down it, remaining vigilant for any noise or sounds of danger, Azaria’s disappearance didn’t change too much – the plan hadn’t changed too much. It had worked well so far, I guess. Though progress had been slow, I was alive – the bodies of the soldiers that took a stand against the Fider had been a constant reminder of that – I decided to give them one last, thorough check over.

  I approached the headless corpse first, figuring this one was the most likely to have some supplies – I had been too repulsed to give him a real check earlier, now was my last chance; I had to forget what had happened to this guy and get on with it, so I leant down beside him.

  “Back away from him, right away!” A strong, confident voice bellowed out from behind me, destroying the silence of the seemingly deserted street. The man made me jump from my skin, every hair stood on end as my heart began to beat ten times its normal speed. Without thinking, I swung around, pulling out my weapon.

  “Squeeze the trigger and it’ll be the last thing you do.” The same voice said. I almost dropped the weapon when I completed my spin. Stood a few feet away, were three large, husky looking men, all with machine guns aimed right at me.

  “That weapon is property of the Saviour of Man, place it down, turn around and disperse and you will find no trouble here.” He instructed. The man doing the talking was the tallest of the three, standing between two short, muscly looking thugs. They each had high power weapons and plenty of gear – and they looked like they knew how to use it. I would have been a fool to do anything other than what was instructed, as much as it pained me to know I would be giving up my only means of defending myself, it was clear to see that it was my only option.

  “Okay, okay… I’m sorry.” I said, placing my own gun down on the floor before raising your hands.

  “And the gun on your back, boy.” The middle one spoke once again – his voice was clinical and emotionless, yet full of power and plenty in volume. There was no question that these guys weren’t messing around.

  Without hesitation I unstrapped my new machine gun and placed it down on the ground behind the revolver, before returning my hands to the air.

  “Now the backpack.”

  This time I was a little more hesitant – they were right in saying the guns didn’t belong to me, and I knew that – but this bag and everything in it was mine.

  “Why?” I couldn’t help but ask, regretting it instantly – I half expected them to open fire and shoot me dead just for the cheek.

  “In case you’ve raided anything else from my men. Don’t worry boy, we’re the Saviour of Man, we’re not common thieves. We don’t touch anything that doesn’t belong to us.” He explained, already making his way over to me – still he aimed the gun directly at my forehead – I was beginning to get used to having guns aimed at me.

  I couldn’t help but snigger at his comment too – I found it ironic that an apparent Saviour of Man would say such a thing, ‘wouldn’t touch anything that doesn’t belong to them’, I thought back to Warrington. It was the Saviour of Man that they were at war with, the soul reason was that they were trying to swoop in and take the town as their own for because of its strategic location.

  Saviour of Men were self-righteous, war mongers. The people of Warrington seemed like good folk – I passed through them in their time of need and the entire town seemed united in defending it from the far superior forces of Saviour of Man. They weren’t specially trained soldiers, they were simple Charred Land survivors doing whatever they could to defend their families and homes, was it not for Saviour of Man, Warrington might almost have been a decent place to live – but they ruined it; and now here they were, bearing down on me with guns aimed right at my head.

  “Please, don’t take my stuff.” I said, sounding like a child trying to face up to schoolyard bullies.

  “I just said we wouldn’t touch what didn’t belong to us, don’t you believe me? Are you calling me a liar?” He grinned, taking confident strides towards me, only when he was a few feet away did he lower his weapon. He had long, yet strangely well-groomed brown, curly hair and an immaculate thin moustache that flicked out on either side, with a patch of straight cut hair under his chin. Another one of the two men besides him quickly followed, before beginning to pat me down and search me all over for any hidden weapons, whilst the other kept his gun aimed directly at me.

  “He’s clear.” The searcher said. Without saying another word, the same man then unstrapped my backpack and took it off my shoulders. Like a protective mother, it pained me to see other people handling my bag with the egg inside – they handled it with such carelessness.

  “Be careful!” I almost spat, losing my temper as I watched one of the brutish men practically throw the bag to the ground.

  “Calm down there.” The apparent speaker of the group said, kneeling down by the backpack to inspect my belongings. The other two each placed large, strong hands on both of my shoulders to hold me back – I struggled a little bit, but soon decided it was useless. Out here, there was nothing stopping these men from putting a bullet in me and leaving me to bleed out on the side of the road – I couldn’t over power them, I couldn’t outrun them, I was fucked, I was completely at their disposal.

  “What on earth is this?” The trio’s speaker said, pulling my egg from the backpack.

  “It’s an egg.” I simply replied, deciding not to lie.

  “Yes, I can see that, but what on earth is it?” He almost smiled, holding the egg high and turning it around and over; inspecting it from all sides – he held it like a trophy.

&nbs
p; “It’s a dragon egg.” I said, boldly.

  Instantly the smirk dropped from his face, he quickly lowered the egg and began searching the skies for any signs of its mother as he twiddled with one of the flicks of his moustache, as though deep in thought.

  “You took this from a nest, here in the city?!” He asked; suddenly fear seemed to creep into his voice, as though the realization had opened mental flood gates which sent a wave of water smashing over his prior confidence.

  “No, I’ve had it for a while.”

  “And why is that?”

  “I’m taking it to the Church of Fire.” I explained – growing tired of explaining this story over and over again to every survivor I came across.

  “And who are they?”

  “A small group of people high up in the mountains behind Manchester who seem to worship these creatures – almost like Gods. I’ve been told that if I bring this to them, then they’ll exchange it for goods of enough value to earn myself access to Legion of Light.” I enlightened, watching their faces for reactions – the apparent leader remained silent, his face as cold as stone as I explained.

  “Well…” He said, “This is interesting” He added with slow prolonged words, his demeanour apparently fooling me.

  “My name is Julian Bullandré.” He smirked, holding the egg in his left arm like a rugby ball, whilst extending out his right hand to shake mine – I accepted the shake, doing my best to keep my arm strong and firm. He was tall, but in no way muscular, yet somehow his grip felt as though it was about to shatter and crush my bones to dust. My dad had always told me that perfecting a firm handshake could be key to coming across well to someone; Julian had certainly perfected that.

  “Zachary Jefford.” I smiled, still shaking hands.

  “Pleased to meet you Zach, these two clowns are Mark and Kelvin.” He informed me, nodding to the two short, muscular thugs behind him. Kelvin, a bearded ginger man in his late twenties silently nodded to me, whilst Mark who - likely twice the age of Kelvin - had short, greying hair and a clean shave, remained completely silent, staring at me with piercing eyes that seemed to be judging my every move.

  Julian on the other hand, looked completely out of place; from his two companions, and the three dead soldiers littering the Manchester street, I could see that it seemed as though Saviour of Man’s force was built up of large, brutish men – but Julian was different, with his fair skin, well-groomed facial hair, and a thick head of curly brown hair, he didn’t seem to fit the bill, he looked different.

  “I’ve got a proposition for you, Mr Jefford.” Julian suddenly said, cutting straight to the point as he began pacing around a little. Still, he continued to admire the egg in his hand. I couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow in interest. I decided to remain silent, and wait for him to expand.

  For a few seconds, he continued to walk around, before finally speaking, “We’ve been cut off from our base of operations. We call ourselves the Brotherhood, we’re a small unit of Saviour of Man, we’ve already lost half our squad; they were damn good men.” He said, before taking a pause, he took a deep breath and continued, “There’s a small group of bandits taking refuge in a building near the centre of the city, which just so happens to be our evacuation point. We’re out gunned, and outnumbered.” He finished explaining, still pacing around like an eccentric mad man.

  “Why do you need me?” I couldn’t help but ask.

  “You seem like a good kid. Hell, you’re out here getting ready to march straight through this God forsaken city - that takes balls. We could use your balls.” Julian exclaimed, turning to me with a smile which seemed to take up half of his face.

  “Why would I do that? Don’t you think my mission is hard enough without helping you guys wage a war?” I contended – thinking back to the last time I was dragged into a battle that wasn’t my own. I witnessed a massacre. I witnessed Conrad Logan die trying to drag me out of it. Ironically enough, it was the Saviour of Man that we were fighting that time– and now here I was, little under a week later and that same enemy was trying to enlist me in their war against an entirely different group of people.

  “I was sincerely hoping you’d ask that. If everything goes to plan, we should reach the building within two days – once there, we need to fight our way up to the top. It’s a tall building, perhaps the largest in the entire city, and as far as we can see, it’s crawling with bandits. Sounds bad, right? It sure fucking is, but it’s what’s on top of the building that’ll get your nipples stiff, Zach. There’s a mother fucking helicopter with our name on it.” He proclaimed, sending a thousand rushing thoughts through my mind – but out of all these, one question forced its way to the front of the queue, “How could we possibly achieve that; with just the four of us?” I sighed.

  Julian didn’t reply, instead he let out a bellowing laugh thick with arrogance and confidence – he raised his fingers to his mouth and let out the loudest whistle I had ever heard. The sound seemed to echo for miles around – my first instinct was to run for cover in fear of what the sound may attract, but I held my ground. I had a real opportunity here, if these people were sincere as they seemed to be, then I could cut off a good two or so days of my overall mission.

  As though from nowhere, I suddenly became aware of a sound. It sounded like metal clanging upon concrete - I listened out, with countless images of what was coming rushing through my imagination. They got louder, and faster, louder, and faster, until they began to almost sound like gunfire. I couldn’t help but scan each and every turning on the street, waiting for something to burst into view. In front of me, Julian remained perfectly calm.

  In the corner of my eye, I became aware of movement – and it was fast. I darted my eyes in the direction – there was a group of them, all charging at us with ferocious speed. I reached for my gun, only remembering that Julian had confiscated it when I felt my empty waistline.

  Then I realised exactly what it was – a squad of five men, and ten horses; the rest of the Brotherhood.

  “What the fuck?” I couldn’t help but gasp – sparking a smirk from Kelvin.

  “About time – it gives me the fucking creeps being out here.” Mark mumbled in a low, hushed tone that suggested to me that he didn’t really mean for anyone to hear.

  “Then you’re in the wrong line of work, friend.” Julian quickly responded, with razor sharp wits. Mark grinned at his companion before making his way towards the rest of their squad.

  The horses stopped just short of us, atop of them were another five members of the Saviour of Man; four men, and one woman.

  “You’ll be needing these.” Julian said, passing me the dragon’s egg, along with my new found revolver.

  “Can you ride?” The woman asked from atop of her horse. Despite being the only woman in the group, she looked like she could have probably handled most of the others in a one on one. She was a strong looking thick woman without an ounce of beauty in her. She had hard, harsh features and a face that looked like it had seen a fight or two.

  “No.” I simply said, still admiring the animals.

  “Fine, someone help him on – he can ride with me.” She said, with a sigh – and with that, I was helped atop of the horse. We soon took off riding down the barren, deserted Manchester street. I looked behind me one last time as the store disappeared into the distance – saying a silent thank you to Davey.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Before long, my arse began to hurt as the saddle began to feel more and more like a hard piece of concrete - but I kept quiet and gritted my teeth. The horse ran so fast that it was hard to take in all of the lovely sights that Manchester had to offer. I tried to keep a mental record of how many streets we had travelled down, and how many turnings we had made - in case I ever found myself travelling back through the city on my own.

  "How you handling the ride?" The woman rider yelled from in front of me.

  "Not too bad." I decided to lie - I planned to try and avoid whining or complaining for as long as po
ssible; these were tough fighters, I couldn't show weakness.

  "The name's Penny by the way." She said - it felt good to finally know her name, considering that I had spent the last twenty minutes with my arms wrapped around her - with every stride the horse made, her breasts jiggled against my hands - knowing her name made me feel a little less creepy.

  "Zachary Jefford." I said, I didn't know if the sounds of the horse’s feet clanging against the asphalt drowned out my voice, or if she simply had nothing else to say - but either way, she didn't reply.

  We turned a corner and charged down a wide, long street that was cast in dark shadows from the three story buildings on either side of the road. As usual, crashed and burnt out cars littered most of the way, but they somehow seemed denser on this street. I assumed it must have once been quite a busy road. I had noticed more and more cars on each street as we travelled deeper into the city, but even this seemed unusual, something about Penny’s body language seemed to suggest she felt uneasy about it too. We were forced to a painfully slow pace as we fell into single file as our horses trotted in and out of the countless crashed cars on the street. There was barely enough room for the creatures to fit between the cars. Some of them looked unusually placed, as though they had been put there on purpose.

  "Hold up!" I heard the front rider of the group bellow out from up ahead. The entire group came to a sudden stop - I almost fell from the saddle as Penny pulled the horse to a stop.

  "What's going on?" I asked Penny; up ahead the rest of the group were deep in conversation, ahead of them, I noticed an old, rusty and battered bus parked across the road, seemingly blocking the route.

  “Get the hell out of here!” Julian shouted from the front of the pack, his voice thick with urgency and worry.

  “What’s up?” I repeated.