When We Shed Civilization

Chapter 22

Following Burt, Beth entered the building surrounding the court, with the woman's yelling and cursing at their heels.

He retraced their steps, passing the long corridor with the library on one side.

Were these the woman's books?

They reached the room where they had entered. Without hesitation, Burt climbed through its window.

Was she a reader? Did she enjoy and love books the way they should be enjoyed and loved?

From the ground outside, Burt waved at Beth. "Come, we've gotta leave."

His words tore her from her thoughts. She clambered over the sill and jumped.

Burt caught her. His palms felt sweaty and clammy against her skin. She pushed his hands away.

"What's the matter?" he asked. "If you want to go back and pull her out, do it. I'm leaving. Her friends can arrive at any moment. She has such a lot of food, she can't be living by herself here. We can't afford the luxury to be civilized if we want to survive in this place."

He had a point.

"Damn," she whispered, more to herself than to Burt. This wilderness corrupted the people living in it. The constant fight for survival left no room for compassion.

But to survive is what Beth wanted, too.

She took a sharp breath, then she turned away from Burt, staring downhill towards city center. He might be teaching her to face the perils of this place, but she didn't want to talk to him now.

The landscape around the house hadn't changed, but now Beth hated it. Yearning to get away, she started off, heading for the buildings of the inner city.

The sun had passed its zenith hours ago, but its rays still made her sweat.

A few minutes later, Beth descended the last steps of the incline and entered that formed part of the checkerboard pattern of downtown.

Burt's footfalls followed her.

As everywhere, carcasses of dead cars littered the avenue. In an effort to take her thoughts off the woman's blood, Beth wondered what had made the people abandon their vehicles like that in the middle of the street.

The reports from the last days of the age of tech were sketchy. Riots had put an end to normalcy. Blackouts had bred panic, burglary, and violence. Communications had broken down. Society had fallen apart. Generals had turned into warlords, united states into divided enemies, and villages into warring tribes.

The silence shrouding the cityscape made it hard to imagine the strife and despair that must have ruled here when civilization failed.

A large, black bird turned lonely circles a block ahead of them. Beth knew the species—a vulture. A creature waiting for things to die and to feast upon their flesh.

She had a vision of the bird descending on the woman they had left behind. Yet it stayed where it was, ahead of them. Another calamity must have caught its attention.

"We should hide," Burt said, "until the sun sets. I don't like this place."

Beth ignored him and walked on. She didn't like this place either, but she wanted to get away and to forget what they had done to that woman.

Burt muttered something. She didn't care what it was about.

Should she really discard civilization and become an animal, intent on its own survival only? The unfamiliar scenery framig the street gave a clear reply—this was no place for the meek.

A sound somewhere between a hum and a rumble echoed through the alley. It was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

Beth stopped and listened into the city. A restless wind caressed the ruins, its soft whistling punctured by the remote caws of the lonely vulture.

"Did you hear that?" Beth asked. "The rumble?"

"What rumble? I heard nothing."

Maybe the noise had been the stirring of the ghosts that inhabited the city as they welcomed their new companion.

She gritted her teeth and continued towards an intersection. Strangely, that one was almost free of cars. The bird flew its tight circles almost above them now. It gave an irritated screech.

Had they disturbed it? Beth narrowed her eyes, trying to identify the focus of its attention. As she did so, the animal swooped low, its talons outstretched. At the lowest point of its trajectory, it almost touched the street and picked up a shape lying on the tarmac. Almost the size of its captor, it hung limply from the claws.

The bird flapped its wings fiercely to fight gravity with the added load. It lost the fight, though, and released its catch.

"Let's check this out," Burt said and ran forward.

Swallowing a warning, Beth watched him heading towards the unknown. She was sick of it.

Something didn't feel right here. Not the bird—it had a wingspan almost as wide as a car, but it wasn't big enough to threaten them.

Don't be silly. The rumble from before may have been a building, collapsing. And whatever the bird had picked up and dropped, it was dead.

"It's a dog," Burt said, stooped over the furry shape the vulture had left behind.

Beth joined him. Yes, a dog. Not a large one, maybe the height of her knees when it was alive. Now it was as dead as it could be. A wide-open wound at its side revealed bones and grayish chunks of flesh between rust-colored fur. One of its hind legs was missing.

Something must have eaten into it, maybe the bird.

She had never seen a living dog but knew about the animals from old vids. Yet the creatures roaming the wilderness these days had shed their last vestiges of domestication. Grandpa had run into some of them outside their village. He had told her that the animals counted among the most dangerous roaming the land. Smart and hunting in packs, chasing everything that moved—they even posed a threat to humans.

The dead dog didn't look dangerous, though. Instead, with its glassy stare and a red tongue lolling from its mouth, it appeared lost and sad.

Maybe it had died from hunger or thirst, the last one of its pack.

The bird above them screeched again, made a low turn, and passed a few yards above their heads. Then it gained height and left in a southerly direction.

Burt prodded the dead animal with the tip of his boot, turning it over. Its slack limbs followed the movement only reluctantly.

"It's not stiff," he said. "Nor does it smell. It can't be dead for long."

"Let's leave." Beth took a step back, rubbing her arms against an unwarranted chill. She had seen enough death for one day. And there might be a pack of its companions close by.

"Do you think we could eat it?" Burt asked.

Revulsion clawed its way up from Beth's stomach, making her gag.

"I'm leaving. You can eat that thing. I don't care." She pushed past him and made for a gap between two rusting cars on the road ahead.

As she passed them, a scratching noise came from her left.

She turned towards it. A second dog stared at her, and behind it, a third one. Both of the creatures definitely alive—copper-furred, yellow-eyed, and moving.

One of them snarled and bared a set of pointed teeth.