With my keys clutched in my hand and my feet frozen to the doorstep, I ask myself where all this blood is coming from. Somehow I've still got enough cogs flicking together in my head to reason it out.
It's upriver, somewhere farther north along the Colorado. It's coming from where the Colorado and the Green River meet. I was up north in my old life, back when the colour of the sky was a pretty baby blue canopy reminding us that the sky was the limit.
Then we reached out past that limit with long, greedy fingers of smoke. We wanted to find peace, an end to war made of heavy hydrogen and lithium, but the bombs found us instead. Mankind bit itself in the ass when it levelled the earth with mushroom clouds.
At the junction of the Colorado and the Green river, there were two rocks that the rushing water beat against as the streams converged. They were fat stone pillars, sitting high above the waves, their surfaces smooth and wet. I used them to cross the river as a kid. By the time the bombs fell, the water had sharpened them into pointed teeth. Ten years later, I was shocked to see the river's fangs had stayed the same. They were not dulled by the torrents of water that scraped their surfaces; rather, I felt they had become stronger. Sharper. That was the first thing I grew to accept in my new life: time does not destroy anything; it simply changes it. Everything exists as an energy. It does not disappear when time laps it up; it just repurposes itself for the future.
I'm standing in the outskirts of our new, broken Vegas, but I know the river up north is still bearing its fangs. Nothing comes from nothing.
The blood came from up north. I can see it seeping out from under the front door as I steady my hands enough to ease my key into the lock. I saw the blood spattered on a letter I received from a courier two weeks ago. There was a crude bull painted in red at the bottom of the page. The writer never got to finish, but the man who drew the bull had the courtesy to add a return address so I'd know whose blood it was. I didn't sleep for days. The hoods of my eyelids were painted with red bulls and images of my mother slumped over her desk, sometimes with her pen clutched in her cracked fingers, and other times with it lodged in her throat.
I wouldn't eat until two days later, when my friend Ethan finally convinced me to meet up with him. He wanted to make sure I was okay. He was an avid gambler, and since I helped him out of a tight debt to the Ultra-Luxe slots, I guess Ethan owed me one. When he asked me to meet him at another casino on the strip, I thought he'd be owing me another one soon.
Instead I found the casino closed. People were talking outside. They found a guy nailed to the balcony in the main hall. How awful. How could anyone do something so debased? It must've been a junkie. No, I don't think they even caught the guy, what if he's still walking the streets of Vegas?
Blood is running out from under my door. I don't need to open it to know what will greet me. I knew what would be in the casino, too. Eventually, I found my way home. My brother didn't need to ask me anything, but he did make me eat.
The next week was a blur of bulls and blood. Megan – or Benchwarmer as I came to call her after a few too many at the Wrangler – she was beheaded. Cody up and vanished just to turn up in a nearby lake, bruised and beaten. Skipper's still M.I.A. I was running out of people I could trust quickly, and I began to shut down. Only my brother kept me going. Against my will and, I thought, all logic, he fed and soothed me each day. He said everything would be okay. He knew we could get through this. I even believed him some nights.
My socks are getting wet. My feet shift as I feel the warmth flooding my shoes. It burns my skin more than the blazing red sun.
My brother is here. I can feel him. He's lapping at my toes, along with Cody and Bench and Skipper and Mum. They all feed into my desperate need for revenge just as much as they flow into my fear and despair. As I twist the key in my hand, the rivers meet. They scrape against me and sharpen my wits. The tumblers in my head clatter and click into place once more. For once, the greyness of the world seems natural. The familiarly blurred patches on the right side of my vision are comforting. Warmth stretches up my legs and tickles the patchy skin beneath my cargos. As the waves meet on the Colorado River, I pull open the door and step over the bloody heap in the entryway. My rifle is in the cabinet. My armor is in the chest.
When I leave, I take the new energy with me. It's in every image sparking in my empty head and every wound I plan on making. It squirms between my toes when I walk, and it smiles down on me from the foggy sky.
War may never die, but it does change. It grinds and sharpens and splashes and burns.