My back became soaking wet.

I tumbled down onto the sand, the numb sensation gradually fading away, before a fierce pain came over it. George raised his machete in the air, his fingers tightly wrapped around the edge of the blade, which was coated in blood. My blood. My fingers clawed against the hot, burning earth as I squirmed in agony, withering and twisting like a fish ripped out of the water. The moment he pressed his shoe against my torn and exposed back, I fought to remain conscious over the excruciating pain.

Ki took a few startled steps back. “W-wait, I…this wasn’t the plan. You guys said—”

”Shut up,” Covey snapped.

“No, not this. We’re just going to knock him out, right? That’s what we agreed on!”

”I said, quiet.”

"How much do they think they'll give us for him, fellows?" George's tone was cold, collected. "Fifty, seventy thousand rupees? Maybe even a hundred. That should be enough for everyone to survive on, help us buy new supplies and weapons. And it'll be an accident, that's all." A smirk fell on his weathered face. "Just an accident. He got shot in the head--the exact same way his little friends were supposed to. That's all.”

”This isn’t supposed to happen,” Ki argued.

”He wasn’t supposed to be born,” Covey said under his teeth. “If he hadn’t been, we’d be somewhere else, wouldn’t we?” His voice lowered. “I’m doing my country a favor.”

As he dug his heel further into my lacerated back, my eyes drooped. White spots appeared in my vision. I started to crawl slightly forward in the sand. The ringing was growing louder in my ears as I struggled to keep myself awake. The others. They're waiting back in the cave.

"Honestly, how stupid do you take me to be?" George sneered. "You really thought I could work with..." A scoff rang out from his voice. "Work with someone like you? And you really thought we were going to do something together to stop this. Like teamwork? Like the good old days, eh, Milo? The problem is not so much them. It is you. No. I'll spare them the trouble of seeking vengeance. I’ll do what I’ve wanted to do to you for the past couple of years.”

Covey chuckled as he tightly pinned my shoulders back, my knees halfway sunk into the dirt and sand burning my eyes. Something looked strange about his face—the way that the shadows highlighted his cheekbones, like he was an other worldly presence. The sharp taste of smoke and metal settled into my throat. Blood dripped from the corner of my mouth and rolled down my chin. The tip of the machete pressed against my neck, as George raised the blade at an angle in the air to get a clean angle. He smirked, and I saw how the light became caught off, glowing at its edge.

A heavy gunshot suddenly went off in the foggy air, startling all of us.

George's body stiffened in pain, and a look of despair, horror, and surprise all at once fell on his face. A dark red mist sprayed out, and a deep dark hole gathered on his forehead, spreading outwards like a ripple in a wave. The machete fell from his hand and slipped down the rocks and into the ocean below, creating a silent splash. As he collapsed onto the ground with a thud, I soon spotted William's still shadow in the distance.

He hardly flinched, firmly holding onto an M-4 carabine, two bandoliers hanging diagonally on both of his shoulders. He had a perfect stance, feet spread apart on the ground, eye squinted on his target. Although his hands shook, he calmly reloaded, causing a bullet shell to fly out in the air. Before Covey could say a word, he fired again at him, then one more time. A dark puddle of blood stained the grass and sand beneath us as I collapsed sideways, wheezing heavily. He fired three additional shots at Ki'luwani, who took off running in the bushes for cover, ducking and zig zagging between the trees in the smoke.

William adjusted the helmet on his head as he rushed towards me and tried to help me sit up. Another explosion went off in the air, and he dragged me backwards in the sand and behind a nearby rock for cover. Cursing under his breath as he noticed how sticky his fingers were with my blood from my torn back, he reached into his jacket and pulled out a small plastic container full of pills. They slipped out of his hands, and he cursed as he reached down to pick them up. My head rolled forward, but he grabbed me by the shoulders, shaking them to keep me awake.

Weakly, I reached for the barrel of the gun and pointed it at my chest. “Here.”

”What?”

”Please,” I whispered. “Do what you must. When you’re done, just leave my body out in the open so that they can see it, take it back to the lab and do what they want. That’ll allow Baldwin to ease this up a bit.” I shoved it into his arms. “Then take the others.”

”No,” he yelled. “You’re not thinking right.”

I grimaced in pain.

Caught in a fierce rage, he threw it onto the ground. “I’ve never heard of such a confounded thing in my life. You shut your mouth. You shut up right now.”

My eyelids grew heavier, and I slumped forward, wheezing uncontrollably.

"Hurry up," he ordered, prying open the lid and shaking some in his dirty palm. "Swallow them. It’s penicillin. And if you ever ask me to do something like that again you will love to regret it.”

"Alright," I hoarsely replied--not because I was exaggerating, but because I knew I was going to die in a few moments. So would he. Then everyone else. The pain raging through my shocked body was one factor. What the hell was he doing here, anyway? Why did he leave? As I choked down the medicine, he helped me up to my feet. We stumbled past the two bodies; he kept his eye out towards the woods, gun raised.

"Here. Over here," William snapped, guiding me behind the towering rocks. He caught a glimpse of the deep gash across my naked back and winced. Unable to move forward anymore, I collapsed to my knees, pressing two bloodied hands against the rock. The man grimaced and took a deep breath, taking off his helmet. Without warning, he filled it up with sea water and poured it down my back and shoulder repeatedly, bending down to scoop more.

”It’s going to feel a lot worse if you don’t keep that clean,” he said. “He got you pretty good.”

I bit back several screams, on the verge of howling. Once he stopped, he reached into his satchel, and, with several clean, dried cloths, made sure to cover my wounds tightly, winding the tape firmly around under my shoulder blades and tearing it off from the roll with his teeth. He then ordered me to put on an extra jacket he had brought with him over it all. And in the midst of his demands, I found myself doing what he said in a daze. William gave me a satisfied look, or at least it looked somewhat satisfied as I hurriedly and clumsily buttoned it up, barely managing to do so with the oversized sleeves, pain shooting through my limbs.

”Here,” he said. “Come on.”

In the distance, the hungry flames devoured the village and jungle, or what once remained the camp that Rufus had worked for years to set up. It was a bright orange and yellow glow, a contrast against the dark night sky. The trees swayed and bent over on their thin paper like trunks, never to produce fruit on the land again. There was only ashes and dust and burnt soil, that could not be fertile to produce crops or fruit. There wasn't a single animal in sight, not even a bird or ant.

”Where are you taking me?” I asked, barely able to get out the words. The immense shattering pain on my back made it difficult to talk.

”What kind of question is that? You need to return back to the cave. Forget this plan. There’s simply not enough time. Me and the others—we’ll come up with something fast.” He hesitated a bit. “Let’s get out of of here.”

As I struggled to stand again, I clamped a hand on his shoulder to express my gratitude. I knew I was in debt to him. I didn't know why he had come out after me. William then reached down and handed me his helmet. Before he could open his mouth, I shook my head and pushed it back towards his outstretched arms.

"You can give everyone the signal now," I said---the drug was starting to have some effect on my body, most of the pain had transformed into a fierce, unsettling numbness. "You get everyone ready and run towards those mountains as fast as they can. And don't you dare stop until you reach them. No one stops." I paused to heavily cough. "No one can. If you have to threaten them to run, do it. Whatever you need to do. Don’t let anyone stop until you reach the top of that mountain. There’s nothing back here for you.”

William's eyes widened. “Now?”

”Yes.”

”What about you? You’ll—“

”You want them to stay here?”

That shut him up for a while. Then he briefly sighed. “Where will you go?”

My head was already killing me. “I’m going to where Rufus told me to go.”

A confused look fell on his face. “Huh?”

“I’m going to hell, William. I don’t want anyone to come with me.” A faint smile formed on my blistered lips. “I don’t.”

He stiffened up.

"Go on and evacuate everyone. Baldwin and his men are on the far right side of the beach. They're marching in. You have no more than a few minutes to spare." I struggled to raise my head as my voice trailed into a whisper. "Go ahead, will you? And keep Rufus in good hands, please."

William finally showed some common sense and began to awkwardly clamber his way across the rocks as fast as he could, the hot air settling above him. I shoved my hands into the pocket of my jacket and found a half bent cigarette inside, which I unrolled out and managed to light up with a nearby burning branch. As I released a puff into the air, I tried to move, but it was much too painful too, since fresh blood was welling between my bandages. And yet, I couldn't really feel anything, not even as I stared at George and Covey's lifeless bodies, which were still lying facedown in the sand.

So I sat there.

In the distance, although they were tiny dots, thousands of men wearing camaflouge marched faithfully through the dense, thick sands, only but several miles away. There was no point in running away--where was there to run to? To a deeper level of shame and disgrace? And I was tired of running. I was beyond sick of it. That was all I ever learned how to do. If there was one thing that I wanted my own son to learn, if I never got the opportunity to tell him myself, was to never run away from his fears or problems. They would only grow with time and develop teeth and claws to tear and destroy. They grew stronger with time.

And so, I waited for them to come to me.

* * * * * * *

I managed to drag myself across the sand and onto the top of a warm rock. My bloody hands left prints across its surface as I hoisted myself up. It was so hot due to how the flames were hungrily eating everything, orange and red dancing on what was left to be burned on the cliff side, and yet I shivered, drawing the jacket close to me. I took another deep inhale of my cigarette, smoke rising from my nostrils as I began studying the inky waves in front of me. It seemed much more impossible to conjure up ice and snow. Yet the ocean was its own master, unwilling to submit to anyone, let alone man. The elements did not care about man.

I shivered, although it was everything was ablaze and I could barely see past the dense smoke. The waves continued to beat against the rocks, white foam sticking to their surfaces.

The pain in my head was something that I could never learn to control, not matter how much penicillin I took. But the ocean itself was not independent--no--it consisted of tiny separate drops that all worked together as one. I continued to smoke my cigarette, remembering the agonizing pain attempting to control it caused me when I was eighteen during recruitment training, and how I had never wanted to do such a thing again. But pain was meaningless at this point, only an insignificant hindrance that I had gone for too long without addressing. The men's shadows grew longer and more distorted , and gunshots filled the air and dark sky.

Closing my swollen eyes, I began to ponder what little options I had left. It would be useless to generate ice shards and frost, and my concentration was ruined. A flood would make the southern border of the island inhabitable. With Rufus and everyone else upon a higher level in the mountains, they could easily escape to safety from the rushing waves. The Red Mambas would be pushed back, and then, then what? How long would the water last before they could come over? Was I prolonging their deaths?

Or, let him follow them up into the mountains and chop them into a thousand pieces. All so he can take my child away.

I put out the rest of my cigarette, smoke curling around nose and mouth. The rushing waves against the rocks began to slow as a deep swelling, pulsing rhythm began to fill my head. My fingers dug into the rock I sat on, blood slowly dripping from the ends of my ears, nostrils, and lower lip. This pressure fell into harmony with my own, slow breathing, still matching the footsteps of the men. The water slowed down even further, but I willed myself to not look at it. Clenching my jaw, I slowly held my now glowing, bright blue palms outwards, small spheres of fluid floating from my fingertips and collecting on my skin.

The air suddenly smelled like salt instead of ash and smoke. As the sound of water echoed in my ears, the heat diminished. But I kept my eyes fixed on the now naked shoreline, more blood spilling upon the rock as the cold wetness seeped upon me. Several rocks that had once been kept buoyant from the waves now tumbled below and crumbled into thousands of pieces. At this point, my chin was coated in blood, and I cried out, unable to withstand the pain any longer. And that was when I focused my eyes upon the towering tsunami that remained frozen in front of me, staring me in the face. I gazed upon its great shadow, gasping heavily, eyes bulged. Thousands of screams and shouts filled the air in the distance, and I could see people seeking refuge from the very things that they had destroyed. It was as if nature was laughing directly at them in the face.

I let go of the ocean.

* * * * * *

The water was very shallow; warm and muddy. It splashed around my bare feet, and suddenly, I was on all fours, searching, frantically feeling around for something that I needed to look for but did not want to find. The air was cold and crisp, yet unnatural.

A lump rose deep into my stomach as I blindly sloshed and flailed my arms and hands about. The sand beneath me was lumpy and soft, and around me was a very empty space. I heard a boy laughing with glee in the background, and there was a wooden slab, floating above the surface. I immediately reached outwards and picked it up, shivers running down my spine and back and I looked around me in the cold abyss.

And then I noticed something very odd about my dripping arms and hands. They were a lot smaller. There were no scars, no cuts, just fresh, smooth pale skin. The pain in my back and shoulder were gone completely, and when I saw my reflection, take form, tousled hair sticking out, and yet, it was someone who I barely knew myself.

"He's not in there.”

The voice startled me, and I immediately turned around, releasing a small gasp, still clutching the large board to my chest. Wind chimes blew above a porch similar to my old home, with paint peeling from the steps and wooden boards. Yet the house itself was barely outlined, like an artist had forgotten to complete their painting. The shadow in the distance watched me, resting their arms upon their lap. I remained on my knees in the clear, warm water, which still had gentle waves lapping around my waist.

When I glanced down again, I had no reflection on the surface. I slowly dipped my index finger upon the surface, and ripples spread outwards, into the unknown corners.

“He’s not there, love,” they gently repeated.

The voice sounded familiar to me but I struggled to remember it.

I got to my feet and began to walk---walking normally for the first time in years. The water sloshed around my ankles. In the soft light a woman sat on a rocking chair, and it squeaked back and forth. She had some knitting in her hands, a ball of green yarn resting on top of a wooden basket filled with various colors. Warm light spilled from the windows—yellow and inviting. A scent from a meal rose from the cracked doorway. The wind chimes began to pick up again.

I stared at the door, longing to step inside, but my legs froze. My hands shook around the wooden board in my hands. The woman kept knitting, slowly rocking back and forth.

”I don’t think you’re ready to go inside yet,” she continued. “Why don’t you have a seat out here with me? It’s okay. I’m here.”

Water lapped around the bottom stair tread. I flinched, suddenly wanting to get away from it. But her voice made me look up.

”Talk to me, son. I’m no bad dream.” A small smile appeared on her face. “I’m only a part of you.”

As I remained still, the corners of my eyes grew blurry. I tried to say her name, but couldn’t even muster one syllable.

"You’ve gotten strong alright. You've gone off into the world. Seen things I couldn't have imagined." Then her expression changed. "But you became crooked. Not even all that booze could keep me away either.”

I lowered my head, breathing heavily.

The woman then observed me. Her dark red hair was in a braid, her green eyes bright and hopeful. She wore a sundress, and she beckoned forward with me to her arms.

"Come here. Come."

A bright yellow umbrella leaned against the wall. I made my way up the creaky steps, and as she slowly pulled me into her arms, the wooden board slowly slipped from my hand and crashed onto the floor. My body went weak, and as I helplessly slid to my knees, she gently cupped my wet face with her palms. I struggled to look her in the eyes, but she lightly tilted my chin to look at her.

"Nothing you ever do will ever keep me away from from you," she said. “Remember that, now.”

I weakly nodded, unable to speak. A shadow appeared beside us, causing me to look up. A young boy suddenly stood by the side of the porch, staring at me, placing one hand on the porch wall. My gaze caught upon him. He had no glasses, and his large eyes studied my crumbling form. Then he spoke softly to me, taking a few steps forward.

"It wasn't your fault."

Before I knew it, I had rushed over and scooped him into my arms, holding onto him tightly, breathing heavily, hot water spilling down my cheeks and collecting under my chin. He pulled me into an embrace. The woman placed a hand on my heaving shoulders, her voice gentle but stern.

"Now, promise us this, my child. That you'll never let yourself become crooked again and stand on your own two feet.”

I nodded, keeping my eyes closed as I held onto the boy, as the white space around us melted and faded and turned into dust.

* * * * * * *

The sound of a bird singing echoed in my ears.

I wanted to move my arms and legs, but they were either broken or no longer belonged to me. As I tried to slide my left leg over, immense pain shot through my body, so I decided not to do anything at the moment. The water around me was cold, freezing almost, but its gentle trickling was the only sound in my otherwise empty mind.

A bird is singing.

It took me a while to pry my eyelids open, just so I could get a glimpse of it behind the broken, charred pieces of wood. It had perched on a rotten log that was floating, before flying away. And suddenly, whatever it was that my hands were holding onto suddenly fell out of my grasp and fell down into a plop, and I was underneath the surface of the water again.

Despite how much of a shock that the cold temperature was to me, I managed to push myself up and outwards to break through the surface, holding onto a wooden branch that floated above. Gritting my teeth in reaction to the fierce pain that seared my back, I glanced at the miles of water stretched out ahead—no deeper than a hundred feet. Not a single tree in sight; but what startled me the most was how deadly silent it was. Bodies were floating on the surface of the water, and down below was the foundation of the destroyed jungle.

Honda’s satchel was gone.

I released a shaky breath. I tried my best to not to dwell on this, and instead, kept on swimming, although night soon arrived and I managed to hoist myself upon the floating tree branch to prolong periods of time of staying out of the water. My fingers and hands were so wrinkled they looked like prunes, and I was constantly shivering on account of my chin chattering from miles of swimming.

In an attempt to keep myself hydrated over the multiple days, I froze small chunks of ice and sucked on those in my mouth so that they wouldn’t dissolve. As the water eventually grew shallow, the more nauseated I became, and constantly vomiting left me in a state of exhaustion. Once my bare feet finally touched the ground—a mixture of broken, charred branches and trees and bare earth, did I drag myself nearby to a pile of rubble. The scent of decomposing flesh from bodies who had been floating in the water for days made me hurl. The silence of the washed out land allowed my eyes to close once my head rested upon a piece of broken concrete.

When I awoke, the sky was much darker, and the smell of gasoline, mud, and death had left a combination in the air. Groggy with sleep, and with the meds gradually wearing off, the pain had settled back onto my body. I tried to stand up, but it was impossible for me to walk, so I continued to crawl on my hands and knees, hungry for the sight of a building, a school, hospital, anything. What was once a city here was now gone. The bandages were starting peel off, leaving a sticky, unbearable mess, and the stench only suggested an infection. Due to how much I was sweating and shivering, the stages of a fever were beginning to take place. I tried to keep myself hydrated by sucking on small chunks of ice I created, but my tongue remained glued to my mouth.

After several hours of crawling on my hands and knees, I glanced upwards at the sun, breathing heavily. The torn Red Mamba flag blew lopsided in the air, and the structure suggested to me that this used to be some sort of recruitment camp. An older one, due to the style of the buildings, or what was left of them. Although it was such a foolish idea, there was a probability of supplies being behind there, and I was so incredibly thirsty at this point that I was willing to go in.

The green murky water reached my knees as I leaned against the wall in the dark entrance. Although the electricity was mostly out due to a few dangling wires above the ceiling, I could make my way across the dense shadows in each room, past the floating furniture, desk, multitude of books that had sunk to the ground. A closet of camouflage uniforms were left mostly untouched, and the moldy mattresses floated down the narrow hallway from the barracks and mess hall, which I began heading for.

I continued clinging to the side of the walls, not looking at the four bloated corpses that I encountered in the corner. There were a lot more down the hall down the dark hallway, and the scent of decomposition made my stomach twist and turn. I finally made it down the towards the back kitchen area and began to open up cabinets, the refrigerator which was obviously not working anymore. I ended up finding two large unopened cans of mandarins, which had rusted at the ends.

With my fists, I busted up the lid on top of the cans and began to greedily gulp it down, sticky juice falling down my chin, gulping it down so fast I nearly choked. I scooped up each slippery orange with my fingers, ravenously chewing, and attempting to not breathe in the smell of rotting flesh in the humid air. Once I had my fill, I wiped my mouth with my sleeve. Frantically, I began to make my way across the building, wanting to find an exit—the silence and the sound of the water dripping from the mildew covered ceiling only added more to my uneasiness.

Yet the hallways were long and winded, but it was easy to tell that the building itself was hardly maintained, due to the dim light bulbs and wiring that hung from the sagging ceiling and walls. The place was so poorly lit that I struggled to see, and when a corpse’s boot or hand brushed against my legs in the dark green water, it took everything inside of me to not look at their faces. There was an odd back room with a broken desk partially submerged, with gray file cabinets. Spying a dirty window, I stumbled forward, getting ready to break it with my fists, when an old, faded flyer suddenly fell in front of me.

I slowly reached out and picked it out from the water. The page was yellowed with age, covered in creases and tears, barely held together. The text was faded and blotted over, and I had to squint quite hard to make our each letter. The font itself seemed to be worldly, and it was dated nearly twenty five years ago. Written in bold, dark letters that seemed to be delicately selected by a type writer was:

Fellow brothers of the Reptile King,

Only those who receive this are invited to attend a community meeting that will take place on the fourth floor of 101 Hargey Blvd, from 4:30 to 6:15 pm. Refreshments will be provided for all members. All that we require is for you to bring a clear mind, solid ideas, and a sturdy notepad to put them down.

Sincerely,

Gunther Suggs

Michel Kerrigan

My thumb went under the signatures of Mr. Karin’s name. I read the paper once, twice, three times, then set it down, and began to search the gray cabinets, opening the drawers. But the water had seeped into many of the files stored there, leaving documents and folders so damaged that they crumbled away in my hand. Bewildered, I picked up the flyer again—noting that it looked nothing like an ordinary document, that the only reason why it had not been destroyed was because the water had not gotten to it yet. Perhaps this was a different Mr. Karin, one out of hundreds. It made no sense to me why an outdated flyer would be in a flooded, abandoned recruitment camp, or why anyone would save it for so long over the years.

I had nearly half the inclination to throw it away in the water, but my hand shook around the page. The broken remains of a wax seal was stuck on the yellow edges. Instead, at the very last second, I reluctantly folded it and put it deep in my jacket pocket.

* * * * * * * *

The pain in my back was so unbearable that I had to stop several times. It was a severe blow to my deteriorating body, and despite how other I tried to clean the soiled bandages, I could already see pus gathering around the edges of my peeling skin. It got to the point to where my progress slowed, and yet, I did not know where I was going, and often, I forgot at times where I was. I would pass out, wake up in a completely different place alone with no recollection of how I had gotten there. The absence of people and only water, corpses floating above on the surface for miles made my walking more restless.

I tried to remember the mountains and what they looked like, how the others had headed west bound. There were no trees, no grass, no homes, only broken, dilapidated buildings that were barely standing on their foundations. The water had begun to rise again to my chest, and my bare feet sunk deeper into the swollen ground beneath me. What had been so loud before was the silence—and I found myself lost in it.

“Did you know that the ocean isn’t really blue?” I told a curious bullfrog that sat on a floating stick one cold evening. My teeth were chattering, and the wind blew my hair in my face. “It reflects what kind of colors that the sky is. Sort of like a big mirror.”

As the shape of the mountains came into view, purple and gray with clouds getting stuck at the top, I began to increase my pace, although I had little strength left. My fingers were so wrinkled from them being submerged in the water for several hours a day that I had a hard time hoisting myself over the rocks. My legs wouldn’t work properly, so I dragged myself across the gravel and rocks, hoping to see a face. I broke off patches of grass on the ground and began to chew them in order to keep something in my stomach. As the days passed, my anxiety only grew worse—that no one had made it up here at all. That I had condemned myself to exile, outside of society that once existed without me.

* * * * * * *

A shadow cast over my own.

I stopped limping across the dirt, too exhausted to raise my head. I had forgotten how to walk on dry land—and it confused me how it remained still, not swaying like the waves I had swum across. Leaning sideways against a large boulder, I heard their footsteps come closer to me. There was a voice, a man’s voice. I started to beg them to not run away from me, to frighten the others. I told them that I was alone—that I had nobody and I never would. I told them that I just wanted them to know if whoever they were with were okay, that I meant them no harm. I had just wanted to see if they had arrived, and I myself would leave them be.

They didn’t say anything—they merely stared at me.

And as soon as these words fell from my mouth, my eyes rolled to the back of my head. I landed face first into the warm dirt, and as they shouted my name, darkness suddenly ascended upon me.

* * * * * * *

The smell of firewood filled my nose. Weakly, I turned my head to the side, and realized that I was lying on my stomach on top of a mat and was shirtless. The air was warm, but I shivered as a gentle wind blew. My vertebrae, ribs, and collarbones protruded through my skin. A thick white bandage was wrapped tightly around my back. I attempted to sit up, but my body protested. The only thing I could really move were my eyes, which were halfway open. Groggy with sleep, I tried to push myself upwards again, the thick grass soft against my flesh. That wasn’t a good idea, because the worst pain suddenly shot through me.

I gritted my teeth.

”Don’t you even think about it.”

William was bent over a small fire, where two fish were slowly cooking. He frowned at and straightened up, before wiping his hands and tossing a stick into the flames.

“About time you woke up. You’ve slept for so long I thought you passed on. I’ve been checking on you every night to make sure you were breathing. I just stitched you up two days ago. The last thing I need for you is to roll all over that area like a dog and make things worse.” He scoffed. “Ruining all of my hard work. I gave you some penicillin as well. That should help with the infection.”

I folded my arms and silently placed my chin on top of my wrists, watching him. His unexpected presence filled the empty void of hopelessness inside of me. William scooped up the cooked fish onto a leaf, which was steaming, and placed it next to me on the ground. He stared at me, and I offered him a slight smile, which he did not return.

“It’s nice to see you again,” I whispered.

William took a few steps away, clearly uncomfortable in my presence. “I’m going back to the village. I’ll come by tomorrow to change the bandages and clean it. Hopefully by then, Baldwin won’t drop another bomb, so we’ll be able to breathe properly at least. The air is much better up here.” He paused. My heart sank as my smile slowly faded away. He was going to leave. He was going to leave me alone in the darkness. “Don’t touch that back of yours.”

“Wait,” I rasped. “No….w-wait—”

The man hesitated, then rolled his eyes. “Look. If you’re going to ask about everyone, yes, they’re fine. Rufus is still in a coma, but he’s recovering well from the amputation. He’ll be alright. I haven’t slept in three days straight, so I’d really like to go back now to my family. I’m not even supposed to be out here.” His voice faltered. “Everyone’s alive. All thirty five hundred of us. We don’t know what to do next—the entire southern hemisphere is completely flooded, and it’s not safe to leave. I don’t want you coming near us. Knowing…knowing what you can do to us if we anger you. I’ve seen what you’ve done to those people. And I don’t want any part of it.”

What you can do to us if we anger you. The words made my eyes burn a bit. ”I only want to apologize. I’m not here to hurt anyone.”

”Then why did you come over here?”

I remained silent.

A look of disgust fell on his face. “Forget it.”

It took me forever to do so, but I slowly managed to completely sit up. My back was tender and extremely sore, but the agonizing pain present before had faded. William watched my struggle with his arms folded across his worn jacket, orange light illuminating his hair and beard.

”Oh, no, please. I’m not going to come near a soul here,” I whispered. “I don’t wish to frighten anyone here. But won’t you please stay here and talk to me? Don’t leave. I just want to talk to you.” My fingers curled up into the damp soil. “I…I could really use the company.”

He looked away.

“Just for a moment. You’re the first person I’ve seen in weeks. I won’t keep you long.” I picked up the steamed fish and held it out to him. “Here, have some. Please, please sit down. You need it more than me.”

William took a deep breath. Finally, he dragged a wooden log across the grass and sat down. He took only one fish. As we quietly ate, the smoke of the fire rose in the air, cracking wood and crickets chirping echoing in my ears. I chewed and swallowed the steaming meat, which tasted like nothing to me. He then leaned forward, placed the bones of the fish on the leaf, rubbed his nose and clasped his hands together impatiently, resting them upon his lap.

“Well? What do you want from me?”

“I want to thank you for saving my life.” I bit my lip and looked down at my muddy pants. “I know we didn’t leave off in the best of terms. But I wouldn’t be here without you. I am indebted to you. I owe you tremendously.”

“Figures. I thought you were dead,” William murmured. He began poking at the ashes of the fireplace. “It’s a no man’s land out there. And whoever is alive is up north. The moment our supplies go down, we have to leave, because there’s hardly any resources out here. Once the flood goes down, Baldwin’s men will be here in an instant.”

”Or what’s left of them,” I murmured.

“We’re still outnumbered.” His expression changed. “He’s going to gather more troops once that water disappears to finish the job. I should’ve tried to talk you out of this. He’s going to find a way to come over here again. You’ve only prolonged our deaths. This water won’t last here for more than few months at the most. And that’s before we either starve up here as soon as we run out of food. There’s not a single animal up here that we can hunt, or—”

”But you’re all alive, aren’t you?”

“You have the audacity to say such a thing.” William bit his lower lip. “Not for long.”

“Nobody should leave the mountain until I let you all know when it’s safe to do so. In the meantime, just make sure that everyone is getting properly fed and kept out of sight. When the rations start to dwindle, make sure that the children get to eat first.”

“Don’t start with this. Who are you to give us orders?” He gritted his teeth and kicked at a nearby rock, wincing in pain as a glowing ember landed on his hand. “We’ll do as we see fit. You’ve got us trapped here! There’s barely anything left. And you didn’t have to wipe out the entire southern part of the island. No one told you to do that. Why didn’t you just come back with me to the cave. We could’ve discussed another solution.”

”Talk?! There was barely any time to do that,” I fired back, my voice cracking. “They were coming in too fast, I had to think of something. His men were an only a few feet from where we were.”

”There wouldn’t be soldiers anywhere near us had you done what you were supposed to do and keep out of the city. Rufus told you this. I told you this. We all told you this.”

”I know, but—”

”You disregarded our advice. You’re trying to ask for another chance when we already have you one. It only took one act of complete carelessness on your part to have our home completely obliterated. You’ve willingly exposed not only yourself, but all of us.” In the orange light, his eyes widened with fury as he pointed at me. “You did this. You’ve put everyone here in danger, and you’re now playing with our lives, leaving us to starve. If you want to save all the skin on your back, you’d better keep away from us as far as you can. This is your responsibility, and yours alone. And there are people are suffering because of it who’d like to do far worse to you than those two men did.”

A long silence passed.

His chest rose and fell. “You don’t deserve another chance. So once you recover, leave, please. No one knows you’re here but I, and I’d like to keep it that way. We’ll take it from here.”

I lowered my head, too choked up to reply.

”I’m going to bed,” he muttered, turning away. “I’m exhausted, and I feel a headache coming on.”

“I know,” I whispered. “I violated the boundary that you, Rufus, and the others had set for me. It was wrong of me. I messed up. Real bad. You’re in this predicament because of me. But please believe me when I tell you that I would never abandon anyone here. At least, please, please understand that. If nothing else, but that.”

He stopped walking away.

“I’m begging you,” I said, avoiding eye contact with him, well aware of how right he was. “I only want to help you. No one is going to starve up here. I’ll make sure of it. You’ll have plenty to eat. I don’t want you or anyone else to worry about that. Ever.”

“Yeah, right,” he mumbled, turning his back to me. “I’ll definitely take your word for it.”

”I’m really, truly sorry,” I whispered, far too quiet for him to hear. “I’m going to fix this.”

William rubbed his jaw, scratched the top of his head. “You left your satchel in the cave, so I took it with me. Forgive me for doing so, but I took a quick peek inside. You have a lot of drawings—paintings, especially. I didn’t know how talented you were with such sophisticated line work and colors. The sketchbook itself was fascinating. I couldn’t get enough of it. I showed it to my family. My child absolutely loves the landscape ones.”

I slowly brought my knees to my chest and hugged them, relieved that he had found it. “Those belong to my wife. She passed on.”

William didn’t say anything.

My throat became tight, but I focused my gaze on the flames. “I’d like to have it back really soon, please. That’s all I have of her.”

He nodded. “Pardon me for asking in the first place, why do you, or rather she, have documents about a man? Well, they’re more like records. Newspaper clippings, if I may say. They looked like they’ve been gathered over time, and there’s all these little notes about this guy’s military achievements—”

”What?”

”Who is this man?”

I stood up so fast I nearly lost my balance. William’s hand instantly went to his gun hanging by his belt, and panic rushed to his eyes, surprised by my sudden movement. His eyes narrowed. Blood drained from my face, and my heart was pounding.

”You’re a spy,” he stammered, looking me up and down. “You’re must be communicating with him at the moment, telling him where we’re are. He’s your friend, right? If so, I’m going to take that satchel, douse it with gasoline, and lit it ablaze.”

“No.”

It came out harsher than I anticipated, and frost began to form on the ground. He drew immediately drew out his gun, pointed it at me at close range. I kept my gaze on him, then slowly held my hands out, realizing my mistake.

”Don’t play with me,” William hissed.

“No! No, no, no, don’t be afraid,” I whispered. “You don’t understand. I’m not a spy, and please don’t destroy it. It’s not what you think it is—I’m just as confused as you are. I’m not going to do anything to you. Just tell me, what man? What kind of man?”

He shrugged his shoulders, relieved. His hand rested on his hip after he put his gun away. “Beats me. A random soldier. But she had all sorts of stuff on this guy. A social security card, driver’s license, receipts, tax forms —I don’t know how she could’ve gotten her hands on this—it’s unlikely any civilian would’ve been able to gain access to such information from the library archives, and you know those were burned down. And the way that they are formatted, well, they don’t make them like that anymore. Every single one is dated at least thirty years back, so it’s unlikely that the guy is still serving in the Red Mamba army at all. I don’t understand it. Unless she went straight to the man’s house and poked around in his basement for a couple of hours. With how secured their homes are, I don’t think that’s very likely.”

I rubbed my forehead. “She was Khonie. Why would she want to do so much research on not just any man, but a soldier out of many who is responsible for destroying her village and wiping out her people? It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

A look of suspicion came on William’s face.

“I’ve never heard of him in my life.” My face flushed. “I swear, I don’t know. Honest.”

He scowled. “I doubt that.”

”Do you remember what the soldier’s name was?” I asked, taking a couple of steps forward in the dirt. His words made no sense to me. “Why would she be interested in researching a completely random soldier’s background? Why does she need so much information about him?” I held out a hand. “Let me see my bag.”

“It’s back at our camp,” he snapped. “I have to get it. So if you’d like to wait until I return, at least lay back down before you tear the stitches out yourself from moving too much.”

”No, no, please,” I said, not wanting to be alone. I was worried that he wouldn’t come back at all. “Don’t go. Just tell me what you found in there. Why didn’t she tell me this?” My voice faded into a whisper. “I didn’t expect her to keep so much from me.”

“You think I know? And how the hell do you not know what you’re carrying in your own bag? Do you think it magically just showed up? You ought to have the answers. I believe it was…” William rubbed his jaw. “Yes. It was a guy named Michel Kerrigan. Is he your ally? Someone you once knew? Because that’s a really strange way to get to know and stay in touch with a person. And…I…I thought you were doing this sort of thing yourself. Why would you get your wife involved in this—why would she even want to do it in the first place? That’s what I’m trying to get.”

Michel. Michel. Shivers ran down my spine and the back of my neck. And suddenly, I reached for my pocket, and then I realized that my jacket was gone. I began feeling around and digging into my pants, wincing in pain shooting up my shoulders. Then my eyes widened. Had I lost it that quick?

“She never told you?”

”No,” I breathlessly said.

”What’s wrong?” William asked. “You look like you’re about to pass out. Sit down.”

”I…I need my jacket, please,” I quietly said. “I would like to show you something.”

”What?”

”Could you bring it to me?”

He swore under his breath, went over behind a bush and picked it up—where it was neatly folded on a nearby tree stump. I reached into the left pocket and pulled out the wrinkled flyer. William gave me a confused look as I unfolded it and smoothed out the creases the best I could with my palms. My mouth went dry as I ran an index finger across one of the signatures scrawled out on the page and pointed directly at it.

”Where on earth did you find that?” William squinted his dark brown eyes. “This kind of print is old school, though, for like the flyers and newspapers. You could only get them done for three rupees per page. Haven’t seen something like them since I was a kid.”

“Is this how it’s spelled?” I asked. “On the documents she collected. The man’s name.”

He studied it for a long time, then nodded.