Two New Scions

by Mermaid-thighs

The Great War rocked the world to its very core, and New Orleans is no exception. A new world, new rules, a new way of life... With an oppresive Tyrant seeking to enslave the ghouls, a mutant strand of malaria infecting the settlers, and the ever looming fear of the Voodoo Queens from Bourbon street, the trek to finding a better life is placed onto the shoulders of just one man.

"Without me, my cats would be starving," I remind myself for the second time this morning. Thoreau purrs and rubs against my leg as I pull on my coat. I bend over to run a hand over his back. The stripy cat peers up at me in the darkness of the room. Looking around, I note the state of the house. I make a mental list of things I desperately need to clean up. The globe was askew. At least six of my books were on the floor. A plate of instamash set getting old on the counter I had built a few years ago. One of the French Flag's corners is hanging off the wall. It needs a new tack. I will remember to look for one while I am out today. I check one more time that the cats' food bowl is full before ducking out the front door. I lock it behind me, and tap the lock twice. "I locked the door." I say this out loud. "I locked the door." I mumble again, patting my coat pockets, making positive I didn't leave anything. I fumble my wallet out of my pack. I flip through it, pulling my papers out, and flip it back closed. My thumb rubs over the now worn insignia, as it has done now for many years. This wallet is older than most of the people alive today. The same can be said about most of my possessions, but the wallet was special. Like no other wallet on the wasteland. As I make my way down the ladder, I clench my teeth together to hold my papers. I know those damn guards will want to see them as soon as one of my pinky toe sinks into the wet dirt.

I hop down off the last rung of the ladder, and the ground makes an ugly wet noise when I make contact. The watertable sits just below the surface here, meaning the soil is always grossly saturated. Smart people around these parts invest time or money into obtaining lead shoes, water tight to boot, so that no irradiated water can sink in and grow them extra toes. New pieces and parts cropping up are actually a pretty big issue for folks making their way the Spanish Quarter or to out to Bourbon Street. But someone has to wade ankle deep in this filth to get those weekly rations. In the early days, when the rivers would get fat with rain water and spill out into the settlements, folks were dying from radiation poisoning left and right. People still thought it was the best idea to live close to the water back then. Finally someone wised up and built himself a home in one of the big trees, and apparently his kids were the only ones without fingers growing out of their belly buttons. Now, unless you can afford a house in the Spanish quarter or you have so little self-respect as to live toward Bourdon, you are "invited" live out in the big trees, near the edge of the city.

Pulling the lapels of my coat tight around my face, I attempt to slip down the makeshift road as quietly as possible. It is early morning; the sun just creeping over the horizon. The usually loud hub of families doing their work or children playing was dampened by the darkness. This time of day was always eerie to me, always demanding a sharper eye than usual. When I was a boy, this was the time of day when my mother would speak with me about things she wouldn't dare talk about when my father was awake. She would whisper in her native tongue about magic and spirits and mystery and ghouls. "Ghouls- ha! If only she had known." I think to myself, chuckling. But my self-deprecating laughter was cut short when the screaming began. In my shock I began to jog toward the sound, debating whether or not to pull my weapon. If the GOB's were there, and I came in with my gun out, they would kill me without a thought. But if I run over there without a gun and it's an irradiated crocodile… well. Let's just agree that would not be pretty. I drop into a crouch instead, using the dark and the brush as a shield. I creep towards the wailing, finally glimpsing the source. A GOB guard had a young woman by the hair, restraining her. Her arm was angled oddly, looking broken. Bastards might have pushed her off the platform of the treehouse. Another guard had a ghoul on the ground, knee in his back, GOB issued pistol pressed where his spine meets his brain stem.

"I said, where are your papers, Sur?" The guard slurred out the word sir, making it sound foul. The ghoul struggled, gasping for air, attempting to speak but only managing frightened wordless squeaks. The young woman was yelling that his papers were in the house, just to let her go get them. Let her show them. The guard that was holding her, a big round man with meaty, wandering hands, told her to shut the fuck up before he took her up to the treehouse and helped himself find what he wanted of her. My hand twitched toward my gun where it sat, snuggly in the holster at my hip. Instead, I simply stand, and walk into the clearing.

"What is going on here?" I demand of the two guards, my voice laced with hatred. "What has this man done?"

"Walk away, pal. Walk away, before you lose your ID too." He exchanged a quick smirk with the other guard, the one that suggested the pinned man's papers might not be inside at all. I stiffened slightly at that. My hand softly tapped the papers in my pocket twice. I know I have my papers, but that doesn't mean they couldn't disappear. The woman had stopped screaming when I had approached, and now I eyed her warily. She looked hopefully at me.

"Can you just go get his papers please? They are upstairs, he has his papers, I swear he has them please go them. Please." Her begging continued. As I put my hands up and began to back away, her voice became shriller. Her voice cracked mid-word when she realized I was really going to leave. She began hurling curses at me. "FUCKING coward. YOU GODDAMN COWARD HOW DARE YOU! HOW DARE YOU LEAVE US LIKE THIS…?" Her words faded back to screaming as I turned my back to the clearing and began to jog away. I heard the first shot go off loudly, and I jogged faster. However, no matter how quickly I tried to get away, I still heard the second shot, and the screams turn to gurgling, and then to silence.

I finally slowed when my lungs failed me. After the second shot, I ran like the devil to get away from it all. I was panting, gasping for breath, my vision getting a little spotty as I doubled over and breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth. I grimaced at the pain in my side, holding it with a cupped hand. "Oof." I say softly, finally standing back up straight. I begin to walk slowly forward, taking it easy now. My head was filled with thoughts buzzing around. I should have stayed. I needed to help. The woman's scream still bounced around in my head. I attempt to calm my shaking hands by focusing on home, of the countryside. Of my mother baking, her long hair tied up into a bun, laughing as I danced in some silly manner across the floor. Of her sitting down beside my father, on the arm of his chair and stoking his hair. Of me sneaking past the living room after I had been sent to bed and seeing them close together, kissing and speaking softly to each other. These thoughts sustained me as I walked. My hands stopped trembling, and I could take deep breaths again. I had started scavenging this area a years earlier, and even though I had been scavenging for years before that even, this place was like no other. Whole neighborhoods stood perfectly lost in time, no signs of damage. I had spent whole days in just one building, finding things I would have never dreamed. In one home I found an entire China case still standing, not as much as a chip in the teapot. I packed them all the way back wrapped in all the cloth I could find. I still eat off that china to this day. In one home, I found something called a Cat Metropolis, a series of scratching posts and fuzzy boxes made for the leisure of rich folks cats'. I carried it a whole twelve miles that day. The ruins I am looking through now are the remnants of pre-war slum buildings, still filled with the possessions and bodies of the poor men and women who couldn't afford safety when the bombs when off. Not that any of us could. The vaults were as unsafe as the wasteland, apparently. By the time I made it to the slum, it was almost midday, and I was sweltering. The heat in this part of the world was so impressive sometimes. I had never experienced its equal in all my days. I jimmied the lock in the first house I saw that looked comfortable. I walked in to find a shady and open first floor. Peeling off my jacket and flopping onto the couch, I pulled out a bottle of purified water. Sipping on it lightly, I had to recount the caps it had costed me to buy it. Every drink made me guilty. I pulled out a packed lunch in a box of Salisbury steak and began to munch on it.

As I eat, I pull out my papers to look at them. They were simply set up: A photograph of my face, my birthdate and birthplace. "9-22- 2042. Paris, France." Stamped in big red letters across the top, rudely demanding your attention, was the word, "Ghoul", and there was a neon green symbol beside it. The seal of the GOB was in the center of the symbol, attempting to ward off the possibility of fakes. These GOB seals were the same as the ones they branded thieves with, the same seal they use to mark murderers. The crimes are all so similar: Stealing, murdering, and being alive as a ghoul. They were so neat, so orderly, these cards, made as precise as the slices of a surgeon's scalpel. I felt sick just looking at them, and shoved them back into my pack. I knew the lapel of my jack bore the symbol as well, as if people couldn't tell by looking at me, what I am. The only folks that had to carry papers assuring their citizenship were Ghouls. This was new to me, I had never experienced this kind of separation from the humans. Even when I first came to this area, it wasn't like this. Sure, at first the natives were wary of me. With the newer threat of feral ghouls running around, even I was watchful of others like me. However, as I warmed up to these parts, the other settlers warmed up to me. About three months in, just after my tree house was built and my French Flag proudly hung on my tree about half way down, my human neighbor brought over some wild berries and a bit of purified water. We sat on my porch and chatted and shared to berries. He even offered to allow me to string a bridge from my tree to his, for easier visits. The afternoon ended after getting tipsy off the whiskey in my cupboard, and boisterous laughter. It was the most at home I had felt in wasteland. Sure, the climate down here was blistering and the mutant malaria was enough to run away anyone sane. That only meant that the men who made their home in the big trees were wild at heart, ready to grab this hell hole by the horns and ride it like a bronco. I think maybe that is why it is so sad to me when I have to sit back and watch the GOB break their spirits day by day. Recently it has been so hard to make myself think about where it all started, the segregation, the fear. It all seemed so innocent at first. The first mayor had died. Until the settlers started trickling in, there was no need for any kind of government. It was just hollers filled with families, warring with each other every now and then. I think maybe those people had been there since before the war, they all seemed so timeless. Their families had lived like this for as long as the earth had been turning, before there was a wasteland to force us all to live like them. However, when the Spanish quarter began filling up with markets and the threat of the voodoo district becoming more prominent, the people of the Big Trees got together and decided that Jerald, one of the older men from the bigger clans from the area should take care of organizing some kind of guard system. Nighttime for the shopkeepers were dangerous. We were only trying to help the working folks safe. We called him the mayor jokingly at first, but it stuck among the folks he helped. He moved into the big house in the Spanish quarter, taking that huge family with him. We thrived during that time. Jerald even kept the voodoo district in line, even with the direct threat of Bourbon Street. However, he died a few years after he "took office". I still mourn his death; he was a good man. The election was an official one this time, first held to elect a council. I was offered a nomination, but turning it down seemed like correct thing to do at the time. I was respected among the folks who lived here for a while, but the new comers might be deterred by a ghoul on the council. My neighbor, Raleigh who brought the berries, he took that office for me. Instead, I would attend the meetings and help mediate our tentative stab at a democracy. From the council, we were to vote for a mayor. There wasn't a particularly fierce campaign, and a man by the name of Archie was elected. He did well, however he was not as trusted as our first mayor, and had quite a bit of turbulence from the council. I think this was where the seeds of unrest were sown. A young man, Charles, was elected to the council, a new comer to our little corner of the wasteland. He was loud opinioned, quick witted, with a smile that would win over an irradiated croc. He seemed to be so in control, on a higher moral plan than the rest of the men who called this place home. Sometimes, though, one of us would call him Chuck or Chucky, and that wide smile would become tight, forced. You knew in those moments that something wild lived in him too, just like it did the rest of us. We went through two more mayors before Charles finally wormed his way into the position. I'll give it to him, there had never been days so good as there where in those first few months, maybe even into that first year. He had a way of talking, which could make anything sound good. The problem was always the food. We never seemed to have enough to eat. The ground was too wet to farm. People were starving. When he first announced the farms that were to be built, to solve the food shortage, we were all rejoicing. The idea was to clear out what had once been parking garages, and use the second stories as the farm. Keep it away from all the wet. Even if it flooded, we wouldn't lose the crops. The poor can work there, he promised, or newcomers, to work for housing. However, as the construction of the farm lands progressed, it mutated from the poor or newcomers to ghouls. His reasoning was always weak as a child's first sip of wine. The ghouls are more suited to that kind of work. The malaria does not affect them like it does the humans. The water won't poison them as they purify it. I was more trusting in those days. The family I felt like I had found had made me believe I could trust this man we had all voted to put into the power. When the farms where up and running, there were ghouls who volunteered to work them. I even rallied to get them to work on the farms. I went and worked in them just like all the ghouls, pulling my time in the fields. Still, not as many as we needed were volunteering. The crops would have failed. I remember exactly when my mistrust began. The first ghoul to disappear was a young woman. I had never moved out of the big trees, even though when Raleigh took the blue house in the quarter and practically begged me to come with him. I think I must have known, even then, that I didn't belong in the big houses in the quarter. The excuse I made then was I belonged in the woods, joking about the wild still in me. We all laughed about it then. The night was calm. The screaming disrupted matte darkness; if it was a possible thing to say, the screaming hasn't really stopped since. We all ran out onto the porches, and we could still hear the screams. By the time we had all made it to the ground though, it was gone, and so was she. Two days later, she was in the field, mute but working. It happened to more and more ghouls, and it scared us all to death. The ones that weren't taken began working the ground to prevent from being taken. I think he would have been taken out of power then, if it weren't for the harvest. The food was bountiful. Charles even thought to make a mandatory ration, giving a percentage of the food to people free of charge. Even with the ghoul problem, the humans were so happy with him, he stood to be mayor for the rest of his life. It was Raleigh who got me out of the fields. After thirteen years of breaking my back, I had told him in confidence how unhappy the work made me, and he pulled the strings a councilman could pull. Still, most of the men I began working with in those damn fields are still there. Still working themselves harder than any man or ghoul should have to work. I spit on the ground, the thoughts of that time in the fields boiled my blood to this day. Raleigh is an old man now, in his early seventies. But, he was no spring chicken when we first met. I worry that when he joins with the over-soul, I will be sent back to the farms. Charlie still has life in him, the pearly silver just now beginning to creep into his hairline.

A creak a few floors above me made me jump back to the present. To dwell in the past is one of my many sins committed in a day's time. I stood, stretching out my back and heard the old bones creaking and popping. As I began to sift through the objects in the home, I notice a dusty corkboard hanging on the far wall. I pick my way over to it, and find myself staring into another time, another world it seems like. A grocery list, with various items: milk, eggs, cheese, diapers, and pizza sauce. A collection of photographs, a mother holding a newborn, a dog swimming in a muddy looking creek. There were several others, but the best one was the father and his little boy playing what appeared to be cowboys. They both wore tall hats and were pointing finger guns. Tacked onto the board beside it were two sheriff stars, made out of what appeared to be tin can lids. In the Old West, a sheriff would bring structure to a town riddled with chaos. He didn't always do it in a pretty way, and he was often rough and crass. I smile as I touch the picture gently, taking it off the board. Wiping the dust away from it, I am reminded of how the GOB came to be. I remember how safe they made me feel at first. Even their name, the Good ole Boys, made them seem homely, friendly. And they were, to begin with. They were better at keeping the Spanish quarter safe than any guard had been before. They not only kept the voodoo district in order, no. They had it running smoothly as a functioning part of society at one point. However, when Charles issued that the ghouls were to start carrying cards, to wear the symbols; that is when the town begin to fall to pieces. I have read countless books about the Nazis, and I have come to realize that Charles must know at least a little too. He knows that making us constantly see our differences will only divide us further, will only make us easier to control. After that, the GOB became a militia. They helped set up a regime on Bourbon Street; now the gangs and violence and black market and voodoo are even more rampant than they ever had been before. No one says it, but if the GOB ever called on the scum from the voodoo district, they would come fight with them. They would be unstoppable, if anyone had the desire to stop them.

I reach out and take the stars out of the cork board, making sure to keep one of the tacks for my flag. If Galileo Galilei could try and convince the Catholic Church that the sun did not revolve around the earth, then I, Galileo of the wasteland, could convince this city that they do not revolve around Our Great leader, Charles.