Page 4 of A Kiss From Death
Yuck.
Thinking back to the day the rogue Necroshriek terrorized our village and took Theo from me gives me the shakes. Necroshrieks are even scarier and uglier than they sound, which is saying something. They feed off human souls and can scent fear from miles away. They thrive off it. Legend says their piercing screeches are the combined screams of every soul they have devoured, now trapped within them. Their giant, black, batlike skeletal wings make them impossible to out run. They can melt a person, bones and all, within seconds with the black acidic clouds they spew from their vicious beaks.
Their hollowed out eye sockets will haunt my nightmares for the rest of eternity. I can still smell its rotting flesh like it’s right in front of me. It’s safe to say I am no longer a fan of birds in any form, especially giant, black, rotting ones that literally look like death on wings. Don’t even get me started on their nasty horns.
Double yuck.
Tomorrow, each sector’s representative from Fallout’s council will host the drawing ceremony by picking two names out of the sector’s participant bowl, and then publicly announce the lucky winners. Once your name is pulled, there is no getting out of it. So, you better be more than sure you know what you’re signingup for. Two sundowns later, Vanquishers will come to collect the ten “lucky” contestants to commence the annual Reaper Crucible.
I send a prayer to the Empress that my name is chosen tomorrow and hopefully chosen only once. That would be an ugly situation to deal with and talk my way out of. I’ll worry about that if the time comes, but for now, it’s time to sneak back home and get some much needed rest before tomorrow’s adventures.
Looking down at the bowl one last time, I am reminded exactly why I’m doing this.
“Love you now and in every life to follow, Theo,” I whisper.
So much for a good night’s rest. Nervously tossing and turning the entire night was not a part of my ten step plan for revenge, but I guess you win some, you lose some.
After I stare out the window for several hours, sun is finally starting to stream in, casting a warm glow on the living room. I take that as my cue to get up and going for the day.
Grunting, I peel myself up off the lumpy “pillow couch” and make my way to our room to get ready. I haven’t been able to bring myself to sleep in our bed, using the couch as my makeshift sleeping spot. This room and bed holds too many good memories with Theo, and I want it to stay that way forever.
I grab a corner of the comforter that sits on Theo’s side of the bed and deeply inhale. It still smells like sunshine and fresh air and reminds me of his warm, infectious, toothy grin he would shine down at me every morning we woke tangled in the sheets together. I fear the day that smell disappears.
Forgoing my usual attire, I stride over to Theo’s pile of clothes and dig through it. I need all the extra strength I can get to get through this day, and having a part of Theo with me is just what the healers ordered.
I find my favorite plain white tee and leather jacket he flaunted often, slipping them on. They engulf me, hanging way past my hands and waist, since they were made for a six foot tall man and not a woman a whole eight inches shorter.
I tuck his tee into the waistband of my trusty leather pants and start cuffing the sleeves of his leather jacket. I don’t want to have a safety hazard if I get jumped on my way to Misery’s Crossing for the drawing ceremony.
Drawing ceremonies tend to get rowdy, so I make sure to strap extra daggers to my body, totaling four weapons I have access to: one in each boot, and two in my waistband. You never know what a Vagrant might do to survive. I’ve quite literally seen people’s shirts torn from their backs like it’s nothing. It’s every man for themselves in our sector.
Planning out my day, I decide my best plan of attack is traveling to each sector to watch their individual drawing ceremonies. That way, I can size up my competition and get a couple extra days to dig around Fallout for weakness in my opponents.
Drawing ceremonies go in order of sector rank, meaning Vagrant’s will be last. That should give me enough time to make it back to ours before they announce the winners.
I walk towards our front door, our old floor boards creaking with each step of my dirty boots. Flinging open the door, I step out into the crisp air and start my trek towards Command Sector for the first drawing.
Command Sector is top of the food pyramid in Fallout, housing our lawmakers and Enforcers. Even though the Empress has final say on what goes on in Fallout, she is too busy to keep up withthe government structure of our sectors, hence the creation of Command Sector.
They create and uphold all laws in Fallout—trading goods, curfew times, education laws, sector transfer requests, anything you could imagine. The Empress then filters through each law created and approves the ones that fit her liking. Breaking any law in Fallout, no matter how small, is punishable to death by the Empress. She has a very creative imagination that is not to be messed with.
Most citizens of Fallout stay within the sector they are born into. On the rare occasion someone shows great strength or knowledge of another sector, they are allowed to submit a sector transfer request to the Command Sector at eighteen. These rarely get approved, but it’s not unheard of.
My breathing is elevated from the trek to Command Sector. I keep my eyes peeled for Enforcers and make sure to weave around them when spotted. Even though Enforcers aren’t as dangerous and scary as Vanquishers, they still aren’t to be messed with, especially since they are not the biggest fans of Vagrants.
“Yeah, well, we aren’t the biggest fans of you either,” I mumble under my breath.
People are already starting to gather in the center of town. Excitement and nerves bleed into the crowd as everyone waits.
I’ve only traveled to the Command Sector a handful of times, so I make sure to take in the rare scenery. It is opposite in every way to Vagrant’s Sector. Where we thrive on chaos and danger, they thrive on purpose and structure. The colors of the buildings are neutral and bland, all by design. Everything has harsh, straight edges and serves a purpose. It’s clean and so boring. I would never want to live here.
Even their citizens have zero personality and are painful snobs to be around. I guess you can act that way when you’re a member of the top sector.
Weaving my way through the growing crowd, I hear excited whispers of people swearing this is the year they will finally get picked. I find it odd how everyone is so excited for the chance to basically sacrifice themselves to the Empress solely for her entertainment. That’s not how they see it, though. They see it as their ticket to a better life.
Pfft, losers.
The crowd hushes when a burly, cruel looking man approaches the makeshift dais in front of us. I assume he is the Command Sector’s council representative. I have never seen him before; I make it a habit to keep my nose out of the politics of Fallout, but by the way he commands the crowd’s respect and attention, I can assume so.
