Tales From Beyond These Walls | Book 1 | Fury, page 3
part #1 of Tales From Beyond These Walls Series
Reuben dropped his gaze again. Even with his focus on his feet, the attention from those around burned into him. Did Danko not realise they were on the same side?
“Let me tell you something, new boy, you won’t be looking this crisp by the time you’ve spent a few weeks outside the city. It might have been a game for you until now—”
“I don’t think it’s a game.”
Danko’s response made Reuben’s ears ring. “Did I say you could speak?”
Clenching everything tight, Reuben held onto his reply.
“People die outside these walls. Frequently. You’d best be tough, and you’d best listen because I will not die protecting your arse out there. And I won’t waste any of my team on you either. At this fucking rate, I’ll be using you as bait. I’ll sacrifice you first to save my good soldiers. Now pay attention because I’ll only introduce you to the team once.”
Danko walked down the line and stopped beside the tallest of the three women. “This is Hicks.”
Hicks remained focused on the gate, her back to Reuben. She sidestepped from the line and snapped her heels together. From the back she looked like a female Danko. She had a shaved head covered in scars, and broad shoulders.
“She’s done a few years less than me outside the wall. She’s in her eighth year of service. There’s no one I’d want more as my second in command. Don’t fuck with her, new boy. Given half a chance, she’ll tear your fucking throat out.”
When Hicks finally turned around, she scowled at Reuben as if planning the ways she’d end him. The left side of her mouth rose in a snarl.
The next soldier in line, a short woman with long brown hair and a dark complexion. She had brown eyes and wide hips. Athletic, she’d wrestle a bull to the ground and not break a sweat. She stood five feet two at the most. Her scarlet uniform pulled tight against her thick arms. She stepped from the line when Danko introduced her.
“Hernandez. She might be small, but she’s stronger than anyone I’ve met. She’s done five years’ service.”
Unlike Hicks, Hernandez smiled and dipped a slight nod at Reuben. Man, did he need that. At least one of them seemed like a decent human being.
“Groves,” Danko finally said. The girl on the end of the line had tanned skin and brown eyes. Where Reuben tried to make eye contact with her, she refused, her attention on the ground in front of her.
“She might be shy, but she’s the brains of this outfit. You need a way out of any situation, she’ll see it. She’s only been on the job a few months, but she’s proven invaluable to the team. You have a tough path to follow, new boy. Although—” Danko walked closer to Reuben, so close his hot breath pressed against Reuben’s cheek “—I wouldn’t mind betting it’ll be a short path too.” He looked Reuben up and down. “Did you not think to get in shape before you came here?”
Reuben drew a breath and let it go with a hard exhale. Any response would be wrong. Besides, Danko wouldn’t be doing his job if he didn’t make Reuben’s life hard. Better to apply pressure to a rookie and see them crack now than find out they don’t have the minerals when they need them most.
“So”—Danko placed his hands on his hips, a wicked smile on his wide face—“there’s something I need to know … Why are you the only rookie with no support? Doesn’t anyone care about you? Are you that unlovable?”
Aches streaked up either side of Reuben’s face. His jaw clenched, he breathed in and out through his nose in short bursts. His eyes itched with the start of tears.
“Hmm …” Danko held his chin in a pinch while he continued to fix Reuben with his icy glare. “I’ve hit a nerve, haven’t I?” He smiled again. “What, you an orphan or something?”
Reuben pressed his lips tighter.
“You’re too well turned out to have been raised in an orphanage, which is a shame because it might have toughened you up. Do you think coming here will somehow make you a stronger person?” Danko pointed at the closed gates. “That’s a cruel classroom out there. Learn fast or die. So what’s your story, new boy?” He stepped even closer than before.
Those around watched on.
When the tip of Danko’s nose touched Reuben’s, he shoved his leader in his broad chest, sending him stumbling back several steps, his arms windmilling. Danko lost his balance, yelled, and fell on his arse. Only a small number of the people there had watched on before that moment. Now every pair of eyes feasted on the spectacle.
Not only red in the face, but Danko’s entire bald head turned a deep shade of crimson. He got back to his feet. A bulging vein ran from his left temple, streaking over his head. His nostrils flared, his breaths rocking through him in waves. Balled fists and a clenched jaw, Danko stepped closer. He spoke so only Reuben heard. “You’ve just made a big fucking mistake, rookie.” He remained close when he shouted for the others, directing the full force of his yell into Reuben’s face. “Now get ready, troop. We’re leaving in five minutes.”
Danko marched off. Hicks levelled a lingering glare at Reuben before she followed. Hernandez joined the line next, and for the briefest of moments, Groves made eye contact with him. A hint of a smile played across her lips. She dipped a nod and followed the others. At least he had someone on side. A covert ally. Would it count for much? He’d be sure to find out soon. In five minutes, he’d be outside the walls, his life in the hands of the man he’d just humiliated.
Chapter 4
Reuben stood at the back of the line when Danko chose the front. He’d not chosen the best way to ingratiate himself to his leader, whether the prick deserved it or not.
Sarge encouraged the lined-up teams closer to the large steel gates. Grey and imposing, they did their job. They’d held strong for years.
A booming voice, Sarge clasped his hands behind his back and walked with long and deliberate steps, slamming each foot down as if trying to crack the asphalt. His hair a close grey crop that continued onto his stubbled face, a bald patch on his right cheek, where he had a round scar at least one inch in diameter. “Now, for many of you, this is nothing new. For those of you who are going out for the first time, look to those around you. To those heroes who have already served for years.”
Danko made a point of leaning away from the front of the line and staring back at Reuben.
“Those with experience who do this day in and day out are the best among us. They do Fury proud every time they venture outside these walls. Know that today you’re taking the first steps to becoming heroes yourselves.”
It might have been an easy motivational speech for Sarge to make, but he had Reuben hanging on his every word. His heart beat harder with his swelling pride. He’d been living for this moment for the last several years. The red flag flapped in the wind. The baton-clenching fist shook in defiance of anything outside the city’s walls.
Reuben straightened his back and raised his chest. He could be a hero. He could be in charge of his own team. And when he got that power, no way would he abuse it like Danko just had. Why torture rookies when he could help them grow? He’d show them the ropes. Give them an apprenticeship in serving the city like the greats before them. Make a positive difference for those following in his footsteps.
As always, Sarge’s speech drew in a crowd. Reuben had been one of them on many an occasion. It had been the main reason he came here every month. He hadn’t missed an induction speech in the past three years. He could probably give it himself. But he’d never seen it from this perspective. He now stood among giants. He’d become one of the city’s heroes.
“Without people like you,” Sarge went on, “this great city would have fallen years ago. We’re great because of you, and we will remain great because of your sacrifice. So, on behalf of everyone here watching on, and everyone in the city, thank you for your service.” He saluted the soldiers.
The snap of their heels came together in unison, all of them returning Sarge’s gesture, the tips of their fingers on their right hands pressed against their right temples.
The clack of metal feet approached the gates. They carved a path, forcing the spectators aside. Only six of them today, the small robotic dogs stood about a foot tall and a few feet long. Made from steel, they might have been small, but what they lacked in size, they more than made up for with their strength. Jaws that could bite through rocks. They breathed fire. They never got fatigued because they were powered by solar panels on their backs. The robotic dogs would be beside them when they went out into the city.
Like many of the leaders, five of the dogs wore the scars of war. But one of them glistened in the sun. A rookie like Reuben. This one had come straight from the community that supplied them to Fury. Apparently they had the tech, and Fury had the food supplies. They’d come to an agreement years back. It worked. As yet, Fury still didn’t have the resources or skills to make the dogs themselves.
Once the dogs had moved to the front, Sarge stamped his foot, his face reddening with the effort of his call, “Good luck, soldiers.” He stood below the flag and pumped the air with a fist, a metal baton in his hand. “This is for Fury.”
The soldiers raised their batons as one. “For Fury!”
Whatever had gone on with Reuben and Danko, hopefully they could put it behind them. A misunderstanding. Reuben had been a hot-headed prick and needed to apologise. He’d make everything okay. He had to. For the sake of the team.
Chapter 5
The chains brushed against the steel gates with a sawing whine. A rattling, shrill, and continuous note. It jangled Reuben’s nerves. His stomach turned backflips. The large steel barriers twitched, shook, and then opened inwards. He’d seen this a thousand times before, but that had been from the safety of the crowd. Hard to prepare for this moment. For the first time in his life, he’d get to experience the chaos of the ruined city beyond Fury’s walls.
The crack in the gates grew as if they were being driven wide by the bright sun. Its glare dazzled Reuben. An interrogator’s torch he couldn’t avoid. Did he really have it in him to be a soldier? Or, in a month’s time, would he just be another statistic? Another rookie who didn’t adapt fast enough. They might have had robotic dogs beside them, but they carried hollow metal batons. An inch in diameter and about a foot long, they were only equipped for close combat. It put them within biting reach of disease-ridden teeth.
Reuben remained at the back of his group. The opening gates had taken Danko’s attention. The group on the far left moved off. Then the next group. Reuben’s team went third.
Danko ushered Hicks and the others past. He waited for Reuben. “That stunt back there has waived your right to a gentle introduction. You’d best be a fast learner. For your sake. Now let’s go.”
Reuben froze. Sarge shrugged at him. What the fuck was he waiting for? If he’d heard Danko’s threat, he hid it well. And why should he care? When they were outside the walls, Danko called the shots.
Danko overtook the rest of his team to reclaim the lead. Sarge continued to scowl. Reuben had best go now or deal with the older man’s wrath. He leaned forwards, gravity giving him the shove he needed to move. He took off after the others.
The only group of the first three to enter the city at a sprint. Danko’s path took them through the two teams of five who’d set off ahead of them.
When they were clear of the other teams, Danko quickened his pace. Reuben twisted and turned his way through the new recruits and their leaders. But he could match Danko stride for stride. He’d trained long and hard for this. Danko had underestimated him, and he’d see that when Reuben stuck to him like a shadow.
Groves ran ahead of Reuben, Hernandez ahead of her. If Hicks ran any closer to Danko, she’d be on his back.
When Danko looked behind, Reuben stretched his mouth wide and gasped for air, making more of the run than he needed to. Give his leader what he wanted. Pretend to be weak. Better to be underestimated.
Like every kid growing up in Fury, Reuben had climbed one of the ladders leaning against the external walls. He’d done it weekly, searching for signs of the diseased. The first time he saw one, it gave him nightmares for weeks. The thing stared straight at him. It fixed him with its ravenous crimson glare. But even then, even when he cried himself to sleep and checked out of his window in case the wall had fallen, he’d felt safe. Protected. Now the responsibility for the city’s sleeping children rested on his shoulders.
The ruined buildings in the city stood much taller than he’d first thought. He’d used the walls surrounding Fury as his yard stick, the walls that had kept him safe for his entire life. But the abandoned towers dwarfed them. The glass absent from every window, crushed into the dust and dirt on the ground that glistened like glitter. Larger shards remained and occasionally crunched beneath his steps. The wind played a different symphony through the old towers than it did under Malcolm’s bridge. Higher in pitch. Multi-tonal. A requiem to the memory of what this place had once been.
Cracks cobwebbed the asphalt streets. Tufts of grass sprouted through the black crust. The green shoots lay as vibrant streaks across the old white painted lines. Easy enough to imagine what the city had once been, but how many years would it take for entropy to hide the narrative? Entropy or destruction. How many more years would they be fighting their war?
Bullet holes pockmarked many of the building’s walls. Scorch marks were present in equal measure. Stains from the battles between dogs and drones. A war infinitely more fierce than close combat with batons and knives.
Danko led them into a small two-storey building. It had once been someone’s house. Their personal effects long gone, the building’s skeleton remained. The floors were bare. A flight of grey concrete stairs led to the next level.
Despite his size, Danko flew through the old house. He tore across the first floor, hopping from beam to beam. The floorboards were long gone. He maintained his stride when he stepped on the window ledge of an upstairs window and kicked off. He caught the roof of the house next door and pulled himself up as if he were weightless.
Hicks flew across after him, as did Hernandez.
“You okay?” Groves called back.
Nice that she cared, but she didn’t slow her pace. She followed the others, crossing the six-foot gap in one bound.
If Reuben slowed now, he wouldn’t make it. And how far did he have to fall? One storey wouldn’t kill him. Unless it broke his legs and Danko left him there. Or a drone found him. Or a diseased. A sharp shake of his head snapped the thoughts away. The ground floor visible because of the absent floorboards, he reached the window ledge and jumped, his arms flailing as he cleared the gap. The rough bricks bit into his hands when he caught the edge of the roof. His boots slipped on the wall with their scrabbling search for purchase.
By the time Reuben had pulled himself up, Danko had already crossed to the next building, this one another step higher.
The gaps grew wider, the buildings taller. His heart in his throat, Reuben followed the others. He committed to every jump. If they could do it, then so could he. Although, how high would be too high? He might run with the best of them, but …
Danko reached the last house in the line, sprinted across its roof, and jumped through a window of a hotel. He pulled into a ball to pass through the smaller gap.
Reuben followed the others and landed with a crunch of glass a few seconds later. On Groves’ tail, he burst from the room. A long corridor stretched away from them, any trace of carpets or flooring long gone. Just a runway of grey concrete. Rooms without doors on either side, time had eaten away at their jagged wooden frames.
Their steps echoed in the tight space, as did Danko’s mocking tone. “I hope you’re not afraid of heights, new boy?”
Fuck him. “Anything you can do, Danko.”
A steel fire door at the end of the hallway. A safety measure when safety measures were factored into the designs of buildings. In Fury, house fires claimed lives, but the responsibility for fire safety sat squarely with the tenant, not the builder.
Crash! Danko kicked the door so hard it slammed into the wall on the other side with a crack. A shower of dust fell from the doorframe.
But instead of going up like he’d threatened, Danko went down into the dark stairwell. Hicks and the others followed, Reuben last. The footsteps and heavy breaths were the only soundtrack to their workout. Those and the occasional slap from where a wall halted their descent, allowing them to turn one hundred and eighty degrees to take the next flight. What if they bumped into Fear’s army now? What if they ran into the diseased or the drones? Did Danko even care?
On the ground floor of the old hotel, they charged through the foyer and out into the street. The three tallest towers in the city were behind them. The towers Reuben had studied when he stood at the top of the ladders and looked over the wall. The towers he’d underestimated from his naive perception of safety. Bathed in the buildings’ shadows, Danko led them along the front of the hotel and around the side, back towards the imposing derelict towers.
Danko turned left around the back of the hotel. And thank the heavens. Reuben would go until he dropped, he’d go farther than Danko ever could, but that didn’t mean he’d choose the epic climb.
His steps slammed down and Reuben’s eyes burned with sweat. No need to fake his heavy breathing now. His lungs tight, he gasped as Groves turned left from the alley ahead of him.
Falling into his steps, each one slightly clumsier than the previous, Reuben stumbled as he ran around the side of the hotel after his team.
The second he emerged from the alley, Groves grabbed him by his shirt and slammed him against the wall. She drove what little breath he had from his lungs. Her eyes were wide and her grip tight. Reuben tried to move, but she slammed him back against the wall for a second time. “Stop!”
Reuben raised his hands in submission. She let go and stepped aside. The road stretched away from them in both directions. One of the wider and straighter streets. A crack ran down its centre, a livid scar torn into it as if a great machine had ploughed the asphalt. An exposed spine of an ancient gargantuan beast.
