CHAPTER 1 - FUCKED UP WORLD
Year 2618
How long has the world died? How many centuries, until the few survivors procreated enough for humanity to bloom again?
We are all one family, you might say. And at the same time, we are not. At some distant point in the genealogical tree of the world, everyone connects with the few "Originals", survivors of the great and continual holocaust that was the agonizing death of the world.
We killed the only home we had, like the ungrateful bastards we are and pretend not to be anymore. We sing praises to Nature as if we might get some consideration from Her, some sign that the situation of humanity will improve, and we celebrate every little bud that She gives us as if it were an answer to our prayers.
They say it all began with small, almost imperceptible climate changes. Seasons of the year longer or shorter, but always more severe, until natural disasters became more frequent. Little by little, the small and spaced tragedies accumulated in a way that it became inevitable to think that they were all interconnected and indicated that the world had reached its limit. Pain and fear were accompanied by chaos, and from chaos to war was a matter of time. War by any means that Nature had not destroyed in Her anger.
People died, if not victims of the "revolt of the planet", by human hands. Cities have been lost, and with them, resources we can only dream of today. There was no food, shelter, clean water. Civil wars broke out everywhere.
They say we are better today. What a joke! Spirited talk of elite wanting to appease the mass...
Nuclear weapons were used. How wonderful, the planet desperately trying to survive, and idiots add radiation to the problem!
A few had the brilliance (or audacity) of realizing that humanity was striding toward decimation, and in a last effort to preserve something good, at least a mark that we did not sum up to widespread destruction, organized hastily a collection and preservation of what are now the most venerated records of our history on our dilapidated planet. The "relics" that the Diggers, like me, try to find and return to the surface, at the hands of the Masters, at the price of the meal of the day.
"Diggers like me" in terms. I do not always give the Masters what I find.
After the radiation, the planet revolted even more, until the cataclysm came: tidal waves covered where there was land before, and tectonic plates moved enough to bring forth land where there was sea before. I read that the world began as one continent, so I find a noisy irony that it ended just like this: a single piece of land surrounded by an endless sea.
Billions of people have died. It is amazing to say that, because before reading the data I did not even know there was the "billiard" measure. However, yes, it was billions of people. It is estimated that less than 1% of the population of 2118 survived, and if they succeeded, it was because they were already in the shelters when the Last Wave swept the earth. Of the survivors, only a tiny fraction succeeded in breeding years later. They are the Originals, founders of the world that we have today: the world after the death of the world.
I have heard of sects that worship the Originals, claiming that they were pure enough to be allowed by Nature to give continuity to humanity, but frankly, I think it is bullshit: the world is as fucked up today as it was five hundred years ago. If we can reproduce, when we do, it has nothing to do with purity, but with our parasitic resistance. We are pests difficult to exterminate.
I barely remember the last time I saw a baby. It was not just the world that received venom: our gonads as well. Nature is wise, I have no doubt of it, and if before She was a gentle and complacent landlady, today She is the spiteful bitch She always should have been. Nature simply does not let us repopulate the land as before, even because this would cause the collapse of the fragile system we have built.
The oldest human being today is 68 years old, a conquest considering that two centuries ago people barely reached 40 years. For me, it is just jerks living too long, which means too much time doing shit. That is why I call this world "Little Sandbox": we bury our shit in it as if there were no tomorrow, and when tomorrow comes, we finally realize that we live in our excrement.
But who am I to complain about anything? No one. I am only the Rat, a Digger like so many others, living in the rubble with the "Exiles", my equals. We have no face, no name, no clan, just a number. Mine is 47, but they call me Rat because I am too small and thin and they say 47 is too big a number for me. We live in the rubble, from the rubble. We search in ruins for traces of who we were, what we did, and sold them to the "Masters", people authorized to examine what we found. We have a pittance to risk ourselves every day, but it is part of this rotten society that people like us get the worst treatment possible. If we are not in a Clan or Guild, we are nothing.
I have even thought about forming a Guild of Diggers, so we would have the minimum of organization and we could claim some improvement in our living conditions, but whom do I want to deceive? The Clan bastards do not want to split, just take, and the more disorganized we are, the better for them.
Takarada Clan, Hizuri Clan, Fuwa Clan, Morizumi Clan and so many others. They could all call themselves "let's monopolize the little that exists in this crap world and treat the rest of the population as trash, and we'll still convince them that we're doing our best to keep humanity from perishing" Clan if it depended of me. Bunch of motherfuckers! Someday I will take revenge on all of them!
The big ones do not remember the little ones. They claim that they care about us because they are fucking hypocrites, and it makes me nauseous to see how the mass believes the lies they tell. They deceive everyone, but not me. I know the sordidness behind the clean, white walls that protect them. They divide society into Exiles, Guilds and Clans just because it favors them. They hold all the resources and imagine possessing all the knowledge. They imagine, and that is where my only joy comes from since they took Maria away from me.
Suckers do not know that this Rat knows how to read and write. That I learned by myself to decipher the languages of most of the relics already found. That I sell to the Clan Masters only what I want to sell and keep what really matters. There are precious things under the pile of trash that is my home. If they found out what I keep, the idiots would go crazy. It would be nice to see, the Masters tearing their hair because a Digger hides information they would kill to get. Not that killing is a difficult thing for them...
They keep us in ignorance because that way we are easier to manipulate. But not me. No, not me. One day they will be in for a surprise, when this Rat comes out of nowhere, straight from the sewers to the beautiful residences, and subvert the order they have created for their own benefit.
Then, I am going to die. No chance to do what I intend and get out alive. Nevertheless, to die in my own way and after avenging myself of them all is the best way to leave this cursed world.
They think me dispensable. They do not know that no one finds as many relics as I do. No one knows where they are, what passages to catch, where to look. No one sinks in the murky waters knowing exactly where to go and what to look for. No one faces sandstorms in the desert, knowing which direction to go, where to dig. No one plunges into the depths of narrow passages buried with my ability. No one is as small and thin as I am. Nor as crazy as I am. No one has the "gift" I have. No one even knows that my gift exists, not even Maria.
I read in a relic that does not share is called "selfishness." I find it funny that there is a name for it, and even more so that the ancestors saw selfishness as a bad thing. I do not know if they were a bunch of hypocrites or just some lucky motherfuckers, who had so much that they could criticize someone for not sharing.
They lived in abundance and did not even know it. Yes, in abundance it is easy to condemn someone for not wanting to share.
After the world died, not sharing became vital. Almost as important as information and this I have to spare. Perhaps I know more than the renowned Master Lory and his acclaimed collection, because no work he keeps is as old as the relics I have. I'm sure of it, because I already infiltrated his palace when I went to look for Maria.
Little and young Maria, my greatest regret. The closest to a family I had after my father died for me. She always came to see me despite the filth that I live in. I always knew it would be a matter of time until her beauty attracted some big shot, but how to avoid the inevitable if I'm just the Rat? I did not save Kyoko, I also failed to save Maria.
Sold by the parents to the Takarada Clan supposedly to be Lory's granddaughter. Yeah, right! As if! In the underworld we know very well what happens to beautiful and healthy girls: bought to be educated and preserved until they become mature enough for procreation or, according to the laws, until they turn 16. The same fate that had Kyoko, sold by the parents to the Clan Fuwa at the age of six, supposedly to learn a profession, only to find her premature end at the age of fourteen. All because Sho, son and sole heir Fuwa, decided that there would be no harm in anticipating in two years what would inevitably happen to Kyoko.
Perhaps, if they had told her that becoming a reproducer would enter the long list of tasks that awaited her in the future, she would not be so frightened when he simply invaded her room like an animal in heat. Perhaps, if she had not been so frightened, she would not have asked for help from the wrong people.
Educated to become the cook of the clan, a difficult craft in times of food restriction, Kyoko imagined she would get the wedding insignia and, only after, become Sho's exclusivity. She did not expect invasion, nor violence. She was an innocent, the only innocent one I heard about before Maria, and as an innocent she perished. It could be said that it was a miracle that she reached the age of fourteen.
This world belongs to the strong and soulless.
In Maria's case, I will not count on a miracle. No, Maria will not have the same fate as Kyoko, and I will guarantee this even if it costs my life.
Maria is not going to die alone on the edge of a river.
Six years later, no one remembers Kyoko, the young promise of the Fuwa Clan in the rare trade of cook, the girl sold so that her parents left the condition of Exiles to be accepted in a Guild. Only I, the son of the man who took Sho's guilt for the rape and the patriarch Fuwa's for the murder, know how the scum of humanity rests on clean sheets while young bodies like Kyoko's feed the aquatic life of this fucking world.
Yes, I remember her. Every damn time I wear the special anti-radiation clothes my father got for me in return for pleading guilty and being summarily murdered by the Monster. The Fuwa clan was unharmed, the Monster quenched his own thirst for blood, humankind was pleased that a barbaric crime was solved and the alleged perpetrator was exemplarily punished, but every day I am tormented by the fact that Kyoko was not avenged and my father was murdered instead of two sons of bitches. It was all a circus, and my father knew it so well that he realized he would be killed one way or the other. If he did not accept the Fuwa's proposal, his body would keep Kyoko's company, so he did what every Exiled does best: he sacrificed his life for a minimum guarantee of survival, if not for himself, at least for me.
But I swear I do more than survive: I build an empire of knowledge. I have no physical strength, no weapons, but what I know is enough to wipe them out.
I just need to play my cards correctly.
The young Maria will not follow the same nefarious steps of Kyoko. No, I am going to act tonight. The first raid on Lory's palace was just a recon mission, because tonight I will have the perfect opportunity to get Maria out of there. I will act when everyone is too drunk after they celebrate the ascent of the Monster, the most bloodthirsty of the judges and old heir of the Clan Hizuri, to the position of Master of his own Clan – the Tsuruga Clan.
Assassins and rapists, that's what the Clan Masters are. Miserable perverts, one day I will end them all.
Everything will start tonight.
A/N - This story haunts me for months!
For those who are waiting for an update of "Learning to Fly", know that as soon as I overcome my discontent with the directions SB! is taking I return to that fic. I just can not deal with the situation "Kyoko being drugged and thrown from a building", however much I do not believe this is the story unfolding. I mean, WTF, it's a homicide attempt we're talking about, and with cruelty refinements ! The mere image of her being cowardly drugged and slowly carried to the edge of the building turned my stomach. Seriously, even "Dark Kuon" did not seem as bloodthirsty as those two women did!
Out-of-bounds aside, after spending months ignoring the idea of this fic, the last chapter of SB! was dark enough for this post-apocalyptic story to come back in full force, so here I am, trying to regain the motivation to write another chapter of "Learning to Fly.
