x
We sit around the fire in stagnant, painful silence.
Directly across from me is a dark olive-skinned woman. She lacks stainings and wears the uniform of a Scribe, but I can see tribal blood in the curve and color of her eyes and the angles of her face. She holds a medallion in her hands, a dented and bent silver circle of carved metal. The ribbon hanging between her fingers is slashed and stained with blood.
Beside me sits a young Timber I met when he was a baby, still just a boy. His helmet rests on the ground at his feet, his name written in straight, legible letters across the brim. Dante Dante. Dangling from his fingers are a pair of dog tags and a torn fabric bracelet.
Behind me, helping me stay sitting upright, is Gamma. Her breathing is soft and slow and her body radiates warmth. She’s sleeping. She fell asleep when she got here and has barely stirred since.
Path, who crouches in the middle, staring into the fire and occasionally stoking it, had told us that he was surprised she was still breathing. Path’s axe lays on the ground just behind him. The painted handle is chipped and splintered, but not quite broken. Tied tight around the base is a charred shoelace.
Mementos. I’ve seen it before. Sometimes things end poorly. People die. We pray that there will be something to remember them.
I swallow and look down at my hands. One is covered in dirt and grime, the other coated in thick, drying blood. I have nothing.
Finally, someone breaks the silence.
“Do you guys think anybody else made it?” Dante asks, shifting and laying his head gently against Gamma’s side.
“Not likely,” says the woman with olive skin.
“What does that mean, then?” Dante continues, now looking at her and trying to keep his eyes from widening fearfully.
Path interrupts before she can say what we’re all afraid of.
“There are others,” he asserts, his tone comforting and sympathetic and sore. “I’m sure lots of us made it.”
Dante stares past Path at the woman, debating whether or not to pursue the discussion further. He looks down, staring into the fire, and says nothing.
“Gamma said that someone messed up the ritual,” I begin. “Path, what the fuck happened? I thought we did everything right.”
“I-... I don’t know. I just don’t know. Everything was fine and then suddenly they were infuriated.”
“Did you hear what they were saying?” The woman interjects, looking from Path to me, and then to Dante.
“Yeah?” Path says. “I didn’t catch all of it. Something about traitors? Thieves? Could’ve been calling us cowards, I didn’t get the context of the rest of the sentence.”
She raises an eyebrow and then frowns, sighing. “He was calling us blasphemers.”
“Shit.” I breathe.
Path continues to look deeply into the flame, and I worry he might dive in.
He says softly, “That’s bad.”
“Who are you?” Dante suddenly chimes in. His tone is hostile and suspicious, and the woman just glares at him for a moment.
“My name is Bianca. I’m a Scribe. I worked with Head Scribe Johannes to make that PMI you’re using,” she says, snappy.
“You look like a tribeswoman,” Dante says. Path and Bianca both visibly prickle, and the air sharpens.
“I was born in the Chao’mee tribe,” she explains dismissively.
“So what was your tribe name?” He pries. By now, Path has looked up from the fire and is staring daggers at Dante.
Bianca sighs, letting out her frustration in a long, bored breath. “Like-The-East-Winds.”
“You made the Portable Micro-Interface?” I ask, hoping to curb some of the awkwardness brought on by Dante.
“Helped. I helped make it,” she says, her tone still annoyed but softening. “As I said, Head Scribe Johannes oversaw the project and did most of the work. It’s amazing, isn’t it? We reverse-engineered a Pre-War Pip-Boy and salvaged that decommissioned robot from the bunker.”
At the mention of another Timber, the silence suddenly falls over us again. Only Path moves, still stoking the small fire at our feet.
“Impressive,” he says. “You should be proud.”
“I am,” Bianca insists. “Which is why I’m not gonna let you blood-fucks look at me like I’m not Timber. I’ve been serving just as long as you have.”
“Alright, alright,” Dante says, lifting his hand defensively, the other one preoccupied holding a thick cloth to the right side of his face.
“Hey Path,” I start. “How many years has it been since we signed that treaty with the East Tribes?”
He groans, letting out an impatient sigh, then clicks his tongue, remembering. “Eight, I think?”
I glance at Bianca.
“Last I checked, everybody in this territory was Timber.”
“Have you not checked in the last 12 hours?” Dante bites at me. “Her people-”
“We’re her people, initiate,” Path spits. “Now shut your trap.”
Dante shuts his trap, grumbling an inaudible complaint before resting against Gamma’s gently rising and falling back, and shutting his eyes.
For a long minute, I just stare into the trees and get… lost. I can feel my face and my body slacken, and it’s hard to think in words. Images flash across my mind and I try to blink them away.
Fields-Of-Jasmine-Weed’s eyes stare dead and blank across the clearing where Red’s body lies still, surrounded by an army of Timber corpses. Everyone’s dead. Every single one. Every single one. Every single one.
“Hey.”
I blink and Path’s hand is resting gently on my knee. His face is soft, and his voice is softer.
“Yeah?”
“You looked like you were freakin’ out.”
“I’m-... Yeah. I’m alright..."
ns 15.158.61.20da2
