Deadwastes

Mason groaned awake, his head sore, his eyes blinking rapidly. His back hurt something fierce, and he felt like his arms were going to fall off.

Managing to regain his vision, he looked around, unable to make out much of his surroundings. The goggles were still on his face, and it looked dark save for what looked like a fire nearby. He tried to stand up, but his arms were tied around something tall and metallic.

He heard voices muttering to each other nearby, but couldn’t make out what they were saying. He would have felt scared if it wasn’t for the surprise that he had found other people so easily.

Or, rather, they had found him.

Mason struggled against the ropes, trying to break free and maybe talk to these people, but he hadn’t nearly the strength required to do anything other than shift his position slightly. The voices stopped talking, and Mason heard the sound of boots crunching against snow moving towards him.

“So this is him, then?” he heard someone, a man, say from behind him.

“Yeah. Didn’t really have a chance to get a look at him, though. I could hear one of those bird-things screaming as I grabbed his stuff. Got out of there as fast as I could.” the other voice, a woman, replied.

The man sighed and walked in front of Mason, tapping his goggles. He was wearing tattered winter clothing and a ski mask around his face, a worn backpack draped over his shoulders. He looked thin, almost gaunt.

“You alive in there?” he asked, bending over with his hands on his knees. Mason, not wanting to alarm them, replied with a simple nod.

The man chuckled. “Louise, get those ties off of him and we’ll bring our new friend to the fire.”

The woman walked back around, wearing similar clothing and a black winter hat, just as thin as the man. She wore a dubious expression on her face.

“You sure about that, Greg? What if he’s a Locksteel or something? I’d like to keep my head on for a few more days.” she said, her hands in her pockets.

Greg put his hand on his chin for a moment, contemplating. Then he shrugged.
“If he is, then we’ll be fine. There’s one of him and two of us. Besides, with this,” he said, pulling what looked like a revolver out from his coat, “he’ll think twice about trying to attack us.”

Mason saw the gun and gulped. He had to tread really, really carefully here. He heard the woman sigh, and felt the ropes around his hands loosen. He stood up slowly, slightly taller than both of them. He rubbed his wrists, but remained silent.

Greg gave him an appraising look. “Naw, he’ll be fine. Won’t you, buddy?” he asked, waving the gun around in front of Mason’s face casually. Mason nodded again, nervous. Greg chuckled and turned around, walking towards the fire in the distance.

“Come on, then.” he said, and waved for Mason to follow him. Louise walked ahead and joined Greg, whispering to him in hushed tones. Mason kept pace behind them for the short walk, anxious.

Soon enough they reached their fire. It was on the edge of a road, near a parking garage. Mason saw his bag lying nearby on the ground, the contents scattered in the snow around it. Looking at the area, it was too dark to make out where he was in the city, but from the size of the street he figured he had to be closer to the center.

Greg and Louise sat down on opposite ends of the fire. Mason stood there, awkward and unsure of what to do. Noticing how he was just standing there, Greg motioned for him to sit down between them, and Mason obliged, sitting down on his knees. The snow had melted in a small circle near the fire, leaving the ground a muddy wet mess.

They sat there in an uncomfortable silence for a few minutes, his breath fogging up his goggles. Greg and Louise just stared at the fire, their eyes deep in thought, before Greg’s eyes refocused and he coughed loudly.

“So, how uh, how’d you manage to get into that Ultramart?” he asked Mason.

Mason shrugged. “I just got a piece of ice and threw it at the window. It shattered pretty easily.” he replied. His voice tasted weird, off, in his mouth. Greg nodded.

“Smart idea. Louise apologizes for knocking you out. She didn’t want to risk you turning around and hurting her or something. ‘Sides, there were monsters around there.” he told Mason. Mason blinked, remembering the wolf monster that had attacked him.

The fire crackled and snapped. “That’s some gear you got on you. Where’d you get it?” Greg asked him, staring at Mason’s jacket.

Mason paused, unsure of what to say. There was no way he could tell them what had happened, could he? He racked his brain trying to think of an excuse, some way he could have gotten these things normally.

“I, well, I got them from that Ultramart. Yeah.” he said, just a little too loudly.

Greg looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “Really? How’s that?” he asked, confused.

Mason chuckled nervously. “There was a…” he said, his mind racing, “a dead person, inside. I just took this stuff off his corpse.” he responded, without fully thinking it through. He regretted how morbid that made him sound. At least it wasn’t that far off from what had actually occurred.

But they just nodded slightly, a sad look on their faces. Louise took out a crumpled cigarette from her pocket and lit it in the fire, taking a long, drawn-out puff.

Letting the smoke out slowly, she spoke. “Too many people taken by the cold. Sometimes you gotta wonder if this’ll ever get better.” She said, more to herself than anyone else. She wrapped her hands around her knees and shivered. Greg moved forward and tossed what looked like a piece of a wooden table leg into the weak fire, trying to keep it alive.

“You can take off that mask, you know. It’s warm enough by the fire that you won’t lose anything important.” Greg told him, pulling off his ski mask and revealing a tired-looking man, balding, with a five o’clock shadow and heavy bags under his brown eyes.

Watching him, Mason felt that he’d probably be fine too taking off his stuff too. It was hard to breathe with the scarf over his face anyways.

He pulled the goggles and scarf down, letting them rest on his neck. The cold laced its fingers across his face, but Greg hadn’t lied to him about the warmth. He let out a breath of relief, the vapor flowing out into the dark.

Greg smiled warmly at Mason. “That’s better, isn’t it?” he asked. Mason nodded. Greg stared at him for a while, his eyes searching.

“You look familiar, but I can’t quite place where I’ve seen you before…” he said. Mason shrugged. He certainly didn’t look familiar to himself.

Hoping that he was safe enough with these people, despite Greg’s gun hidden in his coat, Mason spoke up, trying to answer some of his millions of questions. He tried something casual, nonchalant.

Nothing that would make them question what had happened to him. Some deep, dark feeling warned him to keep that secret.

“So… where were you guys when it happened?” he asked, knowing he had no idea what “it” was. Greg glanced at him, a distant fear hidden in his eyes. Then he stared back at the fire, silent for a few moments.

“I was living over down in the southern part of town, by myself in an apartment.” he said eventually. “The first thing I remember when I woke up that morning was my coffee machine wasn’t working. Power lines had all been destroyed somehow, but I didn’t know that yet. I managed to force open my door, and saw a stray cat on my doorstep. It had been trying to get inside the night before, poor thing. It was frozen solid.” Greg told him, shaking his head slowly.

“Anyways,” he continued, “I went back inside, grabbed everything that was warm, and tried to bundle myself up as best I could. Everything in my apartment had begun to freeze, now that I’d opened the door. When I was done, I went outside and tried to figure out what was happening. I could hear other people whose doors had frozen beyond help, screaming and pleading with somebody to get them out. I kept trying to help them, but I could only get one open.” he said, and pointed at Louise, who looked at him emotionlessly, the remains of tears traced on her sallow cheeks. “Hers.”

Greg sighed. “She won’t tell me what happened to her, but whatever it was hurt her pretty badly inside. We’ve just been together ever since, all five years of this frozen nightmare.”

Well, at least he knew how long this had been going on now. Five years. It seemed such a short time for everything to go to hell like this.

“What about you? You must have been pretty young when this all happened.” Greg asked, an honest curiosity in his words.

The image of his own dead body staring lifelessly at him sank into his mind. A dark gloom hung over his face. “I don’t want to talk about it.” he told them.

Greg shrugged. “Fair enough. I suppose it doesn’t really matter how we got here anymore, does it? All that matters is that we’ve made it this far.” he said. Mason nodded in agreement.

“Do you mind, uh…?” Greg began, confused. “I don’t actually think we got your name.”

“I’m Mason.” he told Greg.

“Alright, Mason. Do you mind if we have some of your beans? We haven’t been able to find any good food for a while now.” Greg asked, and jerked his thumb toward Mason’s bag lying on the ground.
Mason shrugged. “Sure, I guess.” he answered. Greg and Louise flashed him grateful smiles, startling him slightly, before each grabbing a can of beans and putting them into a banged-up pot that Greg seemingly pulled out of nowhere. Louise took out a little pocketknife and opened them, pouring them into the pot. When she finished, she sat there and held the pot over the fire silently. She seemed morose.

“Thank you. We really needed this.” Greg told him. After a few minutes, they took out a spoon and shared the beans between the two of them. After they both had eaten enough, they offered the pot to Mason. He accepted it thankfully, realizing just how hungry he’d gotten. Putting a few spoonfuls of the warm food down his throat, Mason felt starved. He quickly scraped the pot completely clean.
They sat there for a good while after, silent, each contemplating their own thoughts. Eventually, Greg broke the silence with a cough, and began to speak.

“You want to stay with us for a while? It’s better than being alone. Besides, with all the things out here that want to kill us? We’d stand a better chance as three than as two. So, if you’re willing, you can tag along with us. What do you say?” Greg asked him.

Mason thought about the offer. Greg was offering the very thing he’d wanted to find, but… What if something happened again, like with the wolf? What if he couldn’t stop it? He didn’t want to hurt these two. They seemed like nice people. He weighed his options in his head.

On one hand, he could refuse, and keep going on his own. He might run into another monster or something, but he could probably defend himself. As long as the lightning wasn’t a one-time thing. But there was no way he could be sure. If he died, he’d die alone, with no one to remember him. And he still had no idea what he needed to do.

On the other, he could go with them, and probably would, in the long run, live longer. He might be able to slowly get information from them, and learn more about the world and himself, at least to some extent. He was silent for a few minutes, thinking about both options.

Mason stood up and nodded. “Yeah, sure. I’ll stay with you guys.” Greg smiled and looked at Louise, who hadn’t really moved. His smile faltered for a brief moment when he saw her face, but it came back just as quickly.

Mason stared at Louise, wondering what exactly had happened that had made her so morose. He decided it was best not to pry and left it at that.

“Well, now that we’ve all finished the beans, let’s get out of this weather, yeah?” Greg said. Mason’s stomach rumbled. He was still quite hungry.

“We’re not going to eat any more?” he asked. Greg looked at him oddly.

“Why would we? We need to ration this. I’d rather feel a bit hungry now than be starving to death later.” he told him, one eyebrow raised. Mason realized that he had a point. He’d been so used to having three meals a day he hadn’t even thought of how little he was going to be able to eat.

Greg stood up and walked towards the parking garage, hands on his hips. “What do you think? Is it safe to go in there?” he asked, to both Mason and Louise.

Louise let out a long sigh, flicked her cigarette into the cold snow, and walked over to him, peering into the dark. “Probably. If anything was in there it would already have come out, I think.” she replied. Greg nodded in agreement. Mason slowly got up to join them, but Greg called out to him, giving him pause.

“Hey, put that fire out, would you? Wouldn’t want anything else to come snooping around here.” he told him, still staring at the parking garage. Mason turned and looked for a way to put it out, and ended up just grabbing fistfuls of snow and throwing them onto the flames until all that remained were embers.

He pick up his bag and walked over between Greg and Louise. They looked at him questioningly.

“What?” he asked, confused.

“Well, do you think it’s a good idea?” Greg asked him. Mason took a look at the parking garage. It looked decayed and dilapidated, but stable. And it wasn’t outside in the seemingly constant snowfall, so that was a bonus.

“I mean, probably.” he said finally. “It’s better than being out here, so we might as well go in.” he told Greg.

Greg nodded. “Fair enough. Well, let’s not waste any time then.” he said, and started to walk inside.

Louise and Mason followed behind him at a short distance.

Inside the building, it was just as dark as it had appeared. Mason could barely see the outline of Greg in front of him. He paused for a moment, watching as Greg pulled out a small flashlight from his bag and turned it on. Mason did the same, his flashlight outshining Gregs.

The beams swept through the garage, lighting the way. Greg kept a steady pace, not pausing to look at anything or waiting. Mason kept walking behind Greg, looking around and trying to make out any details.

The two flashlights managed to illuminate a good deal of the ground floor. Cars were scattered all about the place, tires popped, windows shattered, and doors ripped off. Walking slowly by them, Mason noticed that some of them had strange dents and marks over them, holes that looked more like something had melted them rather than broke them. Greg stopped in front of the first ramp leading up and leaned forward, looking into the dark.

“Let’s keep going up. Less reason for someone or something to come up there and look for something.” he told them, quietly, and started up the ramp.

Mason spoke up, asking another question.

“So what kinds of things have you guys seen?” he asked, wondering what could make them this afraid. The wolf-thing was certainly ferocious and there might be more, but they didn’t seem worried about anything like that.

“You know how, after everything froze, everything was at least containable? People still could live, and do things. Society hadn’t quite collapsed yet. That stopped pretty soon after the monsters started appearing. We were lucky. The biggest things we’ve seen are those wolf-monsters and strange bird-lion things that would pluck people from off the streets. Still terrifying and still deadly, but not as bad as...” he told Mason, trailing off.

“What could be worse than that? I’ve only seen the wolves.” he asked, concerned.

Greg let out a sigh, stopping. “We’ve heard stories, from other groups, of horrible, horrible monsters. Things as high as skyscrapers that destroy everything in their path. Creatures made of pure energy that can kill an entire group of people within seconds. And… well, massive winged lizards that they could only call dragons.” he told him.

Mason stopped for a moment.

“Dragons?” he thought to himself. “What the hell?”

Greg started moving again, keeping his voice low. “That’s only what we’ve heard, though. We keep to ourselves mostly, and try to avoid others if we can. Especially the Locksteel gang. They’re a scary bunch, and just as bad as some of the monsters we’ve seen.”

Louise spoke up from next to Mason. “We did see that one thing in the sky once, though. Remember? It looked like an angel, soaring through the sky on giant wings.” she said to Greg. “It was just after that explosion we heard in the western side of the city.”

Greg shook his head and let out a humorless chuckle. “No. That was just us trying to hope for something that wasn’t there. God left us and took the angels with him.” he said, sounding incredibly spiteful for just a moment.

Mason swallowed. The things they described were terrifying. He realized the world was in a bad way when he saw the ice, but he didn’t realize…

“So how have you guys even managed to survive this long if the monsters just hunt people down?” he asked them, trying to keep the incredulousness out of his voice.

“We just keep our heads down. If we see any sign of trouble we hide until the danger is gone. It’s a sad way to live, but it works.” Greg told him. He stopped at the top of the ramp to the second floor and turned back towards Mason.

“The world’s turned into hell. Literally. So we do what we need and never try to go out of our way for things.” he told him, his face serious.

“Then why did you decide not to leave me to die, and just take my food?” Mason asked, shining his flashlight into Greg’s face.

The determination Mason had just before seen in Greg’s eyes faded, replaced with the soft light of regret.

“Because we’ve left too many people behind to die. I didn’t want to feel even more guilt than I already do. That’s why.” he told him, his voice shaking.

Mason stepped back, sensing he’d hit a sensitive spot. “I… I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’ve been through.” he said.

Greg shrugged, then turned away.

“It’s fine. He’s... just had to do a lot of things he’s not exactly proud of. We both have. It’s just the way things are now, and we can’t do anything about it. The world’s a different place, for a different kind of person.” Louise said softly. Mason looked back at her, and could swear that even in the dimly lit darkness he saw a tear fall off of her cheek.

Greg started moving again, and they followed him through the parking garage, before eventually they managed to find a frozen door placed along the far back wall. Louise took out a crowbar and handed it to Greg.

“Here, hold this for me.” Greg asked Mason, and gave him the flashlight. Mason took it and held it out in front of him, aiming it at the door.

Taking the crowbar, Greg took a step back, breathed in, and swung the end as hard as he could into the door’s side. It resounded with a loud crack, smashing through the frost and embedding itself into
the ice that laced the door.

Grunting, he turned and pushed on it, straining to open the door. After a few moments of difficulty, he managed to get the door free from the ice, sending it flying open. As shards of frost flew away, it revealed a small room that was completely empty, lines of ice tracing along the ground.

“Probably a maintenance room or something. Looks long cleared out though.” Greg said as he walked inside.

Looking inside, Mason muttered to himself, “What kind of people take cleaning supplies in a survival situation…?” he said as he shook his head.

Greg waved Mason and Louise in. “It should be safe enough in here, at least as long as we stay inside for the rest of the night.” he told them. The two of them walked inside and shut the door behind them. Mason sat down and leaned against the closed door, sitting quietly in the darkness. He watched as Greg put the flashlight in the corner in an attempt to give light to the small room. Mason turned his off, wanting to save the batteries. He didn’t know how long they would last.

Louise pulled a dirty blanket out of her pack, and Greg did the same, taking out two and handing one to Mason. They sat down in opposite corners of the room from each other and stared at the ceiling.

“We’re gonna have to get more burnable supplies tomorrow. That was my last piece.” Greg remarked. Nobody responded. Mason sat there, feeling awkward and uncomfortable.

Louise looked at Mason after a few minutes. “We’re gonna try to get to the center of the city tomorrow, too. We heard that there might be a larger group of people who’ve managed to carve out a home for themselves there. It’d be nice to have a chance to relax for once instead of worrying about everything.” she said.

Mason nodded absentmindedly. Now that he’d finally gotten a chance to sit and think, at least for a while, his mind was wandering away. After a while, Greg got up and turned off the flashlight, leaving them in darkness. Soon enough he could hear both of them breathing slowly, asleep.

But Mason couldn’t rest. He sat there thinking about everything, Greg and Louise, the wolf monster,
the electricity, and his body. Everything felt so surreal, like none of this had actually happened, and he was just imagining it. But the cold, these people. They felt too real.

Like a virus, this world felt dead, but, somehow, it moved. And it seemed like it was in pain.
He took off his glove and held his right hand out in front of him, staring at it. Barely able to see, he twisted it and turned it around in front of him, trying to discern any differences.

But he couldn’t tell that anything was different. It was like the incident had never happened.

Sighing, Mason curled into a ball, resting his chin on his knees. He took a deep, restless breath, trying to suck in as much air as he could, before he drew it back out long and slowly. He tried to convince himself that he’d be alright, that he would find a way out of this, but with each passing second his argument seemed weaker and weaker. It was like the world had done something to his head, turned it upside down. His thoughts slowly became more and more silent.

Eventually, he managed to pass into a restless sleep, his dreams filled with giants and burning cities and destroying the land.