E Read Free

criminality
and give them a second chance.  If they break the Covenant a second time, then they're considered to be intrinsically flawed and are simply 'removed' from the
system.  But no one ever mentioned sticking you in a tiny metal box until
you crack.
    You have been warned .  I shiver again.  Is it
meant to compel me to an honest start in my new life?  I don't feel
honest, wrapping myself in rags and pretending to have the pox.  I feel
hardly anything more than fear, and I have the strangest feeling that this fear
will compel me to dishonesty .
     
    ***
     
    When I reach my destination, I know it at once.  The bottom
of humanity's barrel.  Two fires in identical, rusted-out trash
cans.  Black smoke trails spill into the damp air, an acrid infusion of
burning waste.  A scatter of frail bodies swathed in layers of rags hover
listlessly nearby.  Further out, leaning against a chunk of concrete wall,
more are slumped-- broken, or drugged out, or damaged enough to keep from
drawing closer to the fire.  One man has puckered, pink stumps where his
legs should be.  A grey-haired woman stares through eyes filmed over with
a thick layer of milky white.  Here and there, piles of rags identify
bodies that may or may not be alive.  But surely if they were dead, the
others would have stripped them of their belongings by now.
    As I approach, I work up a rattle in my throat-- subtle-- just
enough to convince anyone paying attention.  Keeping my head ducked, I
shuffle into the ranks of the condemned, and try to find a spot where the
fire's heat can touch me.  I start to settle against the concrete wall,
but I've not so much as bent my knees to sit, when another bundle of rags
standing by the fire barrels turns and eyes me wildly.
    It makes a noise of rage and frustration, moving toward me. 
Dirt obscures the twisted face, filthy hair frizzing into the eyes, but I think
it's a boy-- young, skinny, but taller than me.  From the distorted
expression and insistent, wordless sounds of grievance, I surmise that I've
angered someone unbalanced.  He rushes toward me, arms flailing.  I
fall back a step.  My fingers grip my metal stick.  I make my own
noise of rage as I swing for his head.
    He skids to a stop, his feet slipping in the rubble.  He
falls backward.  My stick cuts through the air.  I take a step toward
him, and he scrambles back on his elbows.  He flips over and claws his way
to his feet, retreating to the furthest barrel of fire, where he glares back at
me nervously.  I stand my ground a moment, then adjust myself and sit
against the concrete wall, eyeing him.  My fingers cling to my piece of
metal.
    No one else challenges me.  I scan my surroundings, trying to
sum up any other potential threats, but really, I'm so tired that my mind
wanders.  An old woman catches my eye despite my efforts to avoid her. 
Her hands are so gnarled they're twice their normal size.  I look away, at
the ground, at the dark spots where rain drops are hitting the packed
earth.  I hunch down and pull my rags tighter.  Face in knees. 
This fabric smells like piss.  I would recoil, but exhaustion has taken
over.  I'm weary in every part of myself, inside and out.  Before I
know it, my eyelids sink shut.  I mean to open them, but I don't. 
Not for a long time.
     
    ***
     
    Dead of night.  Everyone is still, lying in piles-- some closer
to the fire barrels than others.  Only the scurry of disease-carrying
rodents and broken rustle of cockroaches disrupt the silence.  In the
broken light of the fire I inspect the slash between my toes.  A little
prodding and I feel the hard chunk of glass in my foot.  Grinding my teeth
and refusing to make a sound, I try to get at it with my fingers, but I can't
get a hold of it.  I dig and dig, but in the end I only make the wound
sting like fire and restart the bleeding.  I sit and watch the fat red drops
fall, sucking down to black spots in the dirt.  There's nothing to do