Salvation

Mama sat up on the thin tattered mattress and coughed a red mist into the air before I could bring the old rag to her lips. “Sawyer, I’m getting worse, the pain I can’t take it anymore,” said Mama. A hacking force coming from somewhere buried deep in her chest has left her lungs screaming and her ribs sore. Seeing Mama like this caused my eyes to gloss over. “It’s gonna be okay Mama,” I whispered unconfident. I looked around at the patchworked walls of scavenged materials. Warped plywood and rusted metal sheets that me and Papa looted during the riots. Now it's just Mama and Me.

A city once blooming, has ceased thriving and struggles to survive. The majestic skyline that kissed the heavens, reduced to a cracked smile in the grey sky. Building’s lay gutted like rotting carcasses, picked clean by the vultures who still call this wasteland home. The streets that once echoed are now silent and filled with dust. Residences caved in like gaping wounds. A place where time goes to decay. The people haven’t vanished. They just wander differently now. Like shadows. Any child cursed to be born in these times have eyes too large for their hollow faces and are inherently irreparable. Makeshift huts lean on each other in the alleys. Trash can fires fill the rotting air with smoke and hopelessness. This is where we live now.

I had one dose of Nexiclo left. I couldn’t stomach another round of Mama’s viscous wheezing, and she needed to rest. I watched, ill at ease as she faded into slumber. I wiped my cheeks and stepped out to clear my mind. Casey was standing right outside my hell in a box. “Sawyer! You wanna come check the traps with me?”

Casey is the only good thing left. We go back to the beginning. Six years ago, Casey wore his robotics club hoodie like armor and would shrink into himself when the world got too loud. Thick framed black glasses always slipping off his nose. Now, the same world he shrunk into had forced him to expand. He’s traded his neat brunet combover for a gritty buzz cut, complete with a gnarly scar running from the top of his forehead to the back of his neck. A souvenir from a knife fight, over a bag of Doritos. His glasses now sit snug on the bridge of his nose thanks to a fist to the face and roll of duct tape. His robotics hoodie has been substituted for a dark colored wife beater that was originally white. He keeps it tucked into ragged camo pants. Casey’s been on his own since the beginning. His parents were significantly older than mine and unfortunately didn’t survive when things deteriorated. Any trace of that scrawny boy from high school is forever gone.

“C’mon a big fat rat’s whatcha ya need!” He pawed at my arm. I couldn’t help but chuckle and follow. There’s little food left anywhere. Casey and I scavenge what we can for the colony. We make sure the few children and elders get the good stuff. Most of the manly men have gotten themselves killed. “Oh shit! alley cats get the rat!” Casey sang as we approached the traps at the deepest end of the alley. There on the wet ground in a wire cage was dinner. The patchy furred rat moved with nervous energy. It’s small, sharp eyes darting around its narrow prison. It’s nose constantly twitched, frantically searching for something…probably salvation.

“I’ll get our little friend here dressed and ready while you hand out the soup cans to the others,” Casey said dangling the cage in front of his face. I reached into my pocket and pulled out two salt and pepper packets I had been holding onto. Casey grinned. I began to make my rounds. The smell of damp cardboard and rot filled the wide alley. Families huddled together in mismatched clothes. Their shirts too big, blankets too thin, shoes held together with tape and string. Their faces, desperate from starvation. Their voices, low and soaked with exhaustion. Hunger had a way of slowing everything down.

I joined Casey by the fire pit and sat down beside him. I stared mesmerized at the small carcass turning slowly on the spit, suspended just above the glowing bed of coals. The remaining fine grey hairs missed by Casey’s skinning of the rat were singed off the glistening flesh one by one with each rotation. “Tastes like chicken,” Casey mumbled with a mouthful of rodent meat. I nodded but couldn’t take my eyes off the hole in the hut, keeping one eye on Mama as she slept.

Casey put his hand on my shoulder. “I know you’re worried about her man. That Cherry Cough has been spreading all over lately.” Cherry cough, that’s the name they gave it. While the very young, elderly, and those with a preexisting medical condition are at higher risk, anyone can contract it. Throughout the alley you could hear it run rampant. “How much of that Nexiclo do you have left?” Casey asked. “I just gave her the last one,” I replied. Nexiclo wasn’t’ a cure, it just suppressed the symptoms. An electric blue liquid contained in a glass vial that’s sucked through an inhaler. It cools down your lungs and lets you sleep, but once the dose wears off the symptoms come back with a vengeance. If you don’t dose once a week death is imminent. Casey reached into his pocket and pulled out two fresh Nexiclo vials. “Here man, for your Mama. Get her through the next two weeks,” I looked at Casey with grateful eyes. “Thanks Case, I don’t know how to repay you. For everything you do for me.” Casey’s hand hadn’t left my shoulder and with a firm squeeze he reassured me. “These fuckers have taken everything from us, but we are gonna make it. Mama’s gonna be okay.”

Suddenly a siren roared and shook the alley. The Sozo Accord was here. The alley people jumped like bugs who scatter when a bright light turns on in a dark basement. The Sozo Accord caused all this. They killed the city and forced us to reside in the slums and eat rats.

About five years ago, news reports began emerging about the Cherry Cough virus. The death toll reached millions within the first year. Following the deaths of both the president and vice president, societal stability crumbled. Subsequently, a previously unknown medical company, Sozo, announced the development of a temporary cure named Nexiclo. You would stay alive as long as you got Nexiclo. It was later discovered that a scientist from Sozo had engineered the Cherry Cough virus, which escaped containment. The Sozo Accord was formed and controlled who got the Nexiclo. Now they dictate everything.

When the siren sounded, Sozo soldiers stormed the alleyway in black uniforms that blended into the darkness. They carried firearms equipped with flashlights and foregrips. They wore respirators to prevent infection. Casey, Mama, and I joined the others, lining up obediently. Like well-trained dogs. The Sozo Accord visits for two reasons: to collect blood samples and to exchange gold or precious metals for Nexiclo and rice.

As the Sozo Accord rose to power, people discovered the high value of gold teeth. They would examine the mouths of the deceased and extract any gold teeth they found. One gold tooth could be exchanged for a dose of Nexiclo and a bag of rice. Papa had three gold teeth. When mama contracted the Cherry Cough three weeks ago, I exhumed his body to pay the Sozo Accord. Our colony consists of around forty individuals. We started with over a hundred. My remaining silver dollars can purchase two doses of Nexiclo and some rice. Without Casey’s assistance, Mama might not survive another month. Tomorrow, I need to scavenge.

At the front of the line, I could see Gustavo was next. Gustavo was a tough old man. He would come over and tell Casey and I war stories by the fire. At the end of every story he’d say, “This world hasn’t gotten me yet,” and bang his knuckles on the back of his head making the titanium plate echo from the cranioplasty. Gustavo’s wife had just developed Cherry Cough. “Please, my wife started coughing this morning I didn’t have time to scavenge, she needs Nexiclo.” Gustavo said to the Sozo solider taking his blood. “Move along, we don’t have time for this. You know the rules,” the solider said. “You piece of shit! My wife will die because of you, and you will die because of me!” Gustavo screamed. He pulled out a large knife and went straight for the soldier’s neck but before the blade could connect another Sozo shot Gustavo dead. Gustavos wife let out a wail and ran towards his corpse. Soldiers intercepted her before she could reach him. The Sozo who shot Gustavo stood over his body. He pulled out a metal detector and waved it over Gustavos head. A shrill rapid beep resonated from the device. The soldier’s muscles coiled up like springs with a sudden, explosive motion, he raised his rifle above his head and brought the butt of it down on Gustavo’s lifeless face. The impact was loud and violent. The sharp crack of Gustavos skull pierced my ears. Teeth exploded out of his head tapping the cracks in the pavement. Gutavo’s head now a macerated watermelon. Pools of blood mixed with rainwater. The solider bent down and dug through the bloody mess. He pulled out the titanium plate from Gustavo’s skull dripping with brain matter and waved it at us. “Anyone else wanna fuck with us tonight?”

I grabbed Cassey’s arm and pulled him back before he could do something stupid. Casey gave his blood, spit on the ground and walked away. A Sozo followed Casey and knocked him out cold. I traded my silver to get Mama’s medicine and a bag of rice. Then I carried Casey to his hut. Before the Sozo Accord packed up I noticed a solider with a long black braid coughing violently. I prayed he’d die soon.

I sat by Casey’s side waiting for him to come to. His eyes fluttered and he sat up with a groan. “Can you believe these fuckers? What they did to Gustavo! I’m gonna kill every last one of them!” I stood up and rubbed at my temples trying to unsee the horrors of the evening. “I just don’t know what to do anymore,” I responded. In the distance, I heard the bang of a trash can being knocked over. Casey and I stepped out to investigate.

“The sound came from the entrance of the alley,” I said. “It could be looters. Get your knife out,” said Casey. When we made it to the front, I spotted the Sozo solider with the long black braid. His respirator was gone, and he had blood dripping from his mouth. Casey bolted towards him knocking him to the ground. With his knee pressed into the middle of his back Casey pulled out some twine and tied the soldier’s hands behind his back. I grabbed an arm, and Casey grabbed the other as we dragged him over the curb and propped him up against a brick wall. “What the fuck are you doing back here?” Casey shouted. The solider spit a glob of red mucus onto the sidewalk. “They can’t find a cure for the cough. It’s beginning to spread through the Accord. The Nexiclo isn’t working anymore. They left me out here to die.”

I felt my stomach drop thinking about Mama. “Sorry to break it to you, but the coughs not gonna kill ya,” Casey said and shoved his knife through the soldier’s temple.

I stayed up, listening to Mama snore. What was I going to do now? I slowly started nodding off. Unexpectedly the sirens went off again. I could hear the thumps of boots on the ground. They never come back twice in one night. A voice from a megaphone awoke the sleeping alley. “Everyone outside and line up!” the voice demanded. I held Mama’s hand and helped her outside. I ensured her there was nothing to worry about even though I was lying.

Everyone lined up outside as a soldier scanned our retinas. An unpleasant BEEP! accompanied by a blinking red light conveying denial rang out as he passed each one. Then as he made his way to me to a soft pleasant BEEP! echoed from the scanner and the light turned lime green. “I got him! This is the one,” the solider said and motioned for a higher ranking Sozo to come over. A six-foot two hulk of a man walked over and looked down at me. “Come with me kid.”

I followed the man away from the group. “What’s going on?” I asked. The solider took a deep breath. “We found something in your blood kid. The Cherry Cough is spreading through the Accord and the Nexiclo isn’t working. Our scientists think they can cure it with your help. You’re a lucky son of a bitch. We’re taking you out of this hellhole. You’re Sozo property now.”

I felt a sense of relief hit me like a wave. I took a step back from the solider and pulled out my hunting knife and held it to my throat. “My Mama, she’s dying. You can either take her with us or we’re both gonna die right here,” I yelled. “Woah, take it easy kid. Go get your Mama and let’s get the fuck out of here,” he obliged.

I went to get Mama and a few things to take with us. A photo of Papa and his old jacket. With our arms linked we made our way towards the armored vehicles to join the Sozo Accord. I didn’t know how to feel or what to think all I knew is that I might be able to save Mama. Casey ran over to me. “Dude, what the fuck is going on?” he asked. “I can’t explain right now man.” I might be able to save everyone. Watch over things while we’re gone. I promise I’ll come back, and we’ll all leave together,” I assured him.

That was six months ago. I’ve been living with the Sozo Accord. They have everything. Food, water, heat, electricity, luxury rooms and Mama’s starting to look like herself again. As a member of the Sozo Accord, you live like royalty, but the horrors above ground persist. Rex, the soldier who took me that night, knocked at the door; we’ve grown close since then. “Yo Sawyer! Dr. Oden wants to see you,” he said from outside the door.

I went with Rex down to sub level three where all the medical personnel did their work. Dr. Oden was waiting for us outside the elevator. “Sawyer! I’ve done it! All thanks to you,” Dr. Oden said. For the past six months, he had been taking my blood samples to strengthen the Nexiclo. I carry a rare antibody, which the blood tests revealed in the alley that night. Fortunately, it was discovered then, allowing Dr. Oden to quickly create a reinforced Nexiclo and distribute it to Mama and the others in the Accord who were affected. “From your blood I’ve created a vaccine that will terminate the Cherry Cough permanently. You are very important to us Sawyer who knows what else we can do with that antibody of yours!” Dr. Oden said.

“We have to get the cure out to the colony!” I said. Dr. Oden rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Sawyer, it’s too late for them. It’ll take many resources to make enough vaccines for your Mama and the others in the Accord. We don’t have the time to save everyone and who knows what other diseases they could have developed,” Dr. Oden explained. “Please! We gotta try and do something!” I begged. “There’s nothing that can be done and you need to prove your loyalty, or we can keep you in a cage like a lab rat. The order is to burn the remaining colonies and move to our west coast base. This is out of my hands,” Dr. Oden said.

I spent the rest of the day alone in my room staring at the ceiling. I could hear Mama singing and smelled a roast in the oven. I couldn’t stop thinking about Casey and the others. Was I just going to let them die? “Sawyer! Rex is here,” Mama called out from the kitchen.

I got up and met him in the hall. “Hey kid, I know this isn’t easy for you but you’re one of us now. You really wanna go back to eating rats? Risk your Mama getting killed? Is that roast beef I smell?” Rex grinned. I said nothing and stared at the ground. “Look kid you have two choices. Live or die. It’s survival of the fittest now.” He left me with that and disappeared down the hallway.

We were leaving for the West Coast base in two days. Tonight was the night. I still didn’t know what to do. Rex, I, and a small team suited up and headed for the colony. As we entered the alley my jaw dropped. There were only eight people left, huddled around a dwindling fire. Casey was emaciated. Blood dripped from his mouth. He locked eyes with me and began crawling. “You motherfucker!” He screamed and hurled a glass bottle. It shattered three feet in front of me. Rex handed me the flamethrower. “Think of your Mama kid these people are already dead! Do it!” I froze. Casey crawled closer. “Pussy.” Rex grunted and began incinerating the others. Casey was now a foot away. “Don’t worry Sawyer! You’ll get your mama killed eventually!” He screamed. With that I closed my eyes and lit him up.