Pacific City Scraps

“Rise and grind, Pacific City!” The speakers mounted to the inside of the rig crackled to life, “Chairman Miner here, wishing you a very productive day! Your contribution to the war effort is second to none!”

A bead of red light rose like a stoplight in the fog. Miniscule, insignificant even, in the pall of clouds that have obfuscated the sky since before Dawson was even born. He rubbed a counterclockwise circle in the windshield to try to get a clearer look at it, but the haze prevented it from being perceived as anything other than a red disc that quivered and flickered in opposition to the steel cathedral of Pacific City. The sunrise of another day to grind.

“Comms check,” Silas’ voice crackled inside Dawson’s helmet, “Looks like we are on Route 3 today, headed southwest.”

“Copy that,” Dawson said. His voice felt lost in the roar of the rig’s engine. The ‘slag cats’ as the scrappers called them, stood higher than a house and nearly as long as the aeroplanes of old. Affixed to the front of the gargantuan machine was its maw. Dozens of interlocking blades and boring drills that formed a thirty foot grinder that could eat through abandoned cars, houses and even sides of skyscrapers. The rear of the cat was a large tank that the shredded materials fell into to melt.

Whoops and shouts echoed into the early morning air as the scrappers heaved themselves and their rigs with intensity into the cold, ashen wasteland. Dawson maneuvered his rig through the chthonic carcasses of hollowed out office buildings that jutted from the landscape, and made his way to the southwestern route. Plumes of dust rose from the dozens of slag cats across the area and merged with the clouds above.

Twenty or so of these massive machines ravenously tore through the remains of the old world. The slag cats guzzled scrap metal and stone in the name of the corporate sponsors branded to the side of their hulls. They screamed across the ruined hills for hours. The sun, if you could still even call it that, was high in the sky before they reached the southwestern coastline. It blinked, off and on, every few seconds.

Dawson looked backward to the ruddy gleam of the City that loomed over the wasteland like a vulture, its wings outstretched to dry after the rain. The walls of Pacific City kept them safe, after the Collapse had rendered most of the population dead and buried decades ago. The Founder had erected the walls on his own foresight and pulled his flock in before the worst came about. A blur of motion thrust him from this daydream as Silas gave him a wave and a thumbs up from the railing of the rig’s tank, his metal exosuit protected him from the worst of the ash and toxic clouds that would kill you in an instant. The smiling image of Gideron’s Medicated Lollies plastered on the side of the tank behind him.

“Do you ever think about what it was like?” Silas said, as he stared off into the wasteland, “You know, like, before?”

“Hm? Not usually, why?” Dawson said.

“Oh, okay.”

“Do you, you know, think about that stuff?” Dawson said.

“Me? Yeah, sometimes.”

“Yeah? Like what parts?”

“Ah, I don’t know, I wonder sometimes what it was like to sit in this place. Sit outside by the ocean and have a beer with your family. To not work and put my feet in the water. You really never think about that stuff?”

“Not work?” Dawson laughed, “Not enjoy all sixteen hours at the greatest job in the City? People love us! The City needs us. I’m happy right here, thank you.”

“I mean,” Silas let out a heavy sigh as they approached a steep cliffside, “Happiness is more than finding joy in the way that you serve the City. There is more to life than whether your job is important or useful.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dawson parked the rig to flush the slag tank, “I like it because it’s useful.”

“I just mean,” Silas hopped off and searched for big hunks of scrap to melt, “Do you enjoy this? We drive around for a hundred hours a week, pull two levers, and give all the slag back to the City and… I just don’t know what it's all for.”

“It’s for…” Dawson thought for a moment, “It’s for the war effort! We can’t just make the other cities get along, right?

“They did it.” He gestured to the fallen skyscrapers and automobiles, “I just wish I could ask them what their reasons were for all of it…”

“Their reasons were probably the same as ours: get paid and live a good life.”

Silas scoffed and walked off toward the cliffside, “Oh yeah? What makes your life so good, huh?”

“I got a house, I have the best job in the city,” His hand unconsciously drifted to the center of his chest where, beneath his suit was a silver locket in the shape of a heart that held a small image of his wife and daughter, “and I have a great family. That’s what.”

“Oh yeah? You own that house or does Gideron? Your wife married you because she loved you or because she was your assigned partner? Come on Dee, wake up man. Pacific City owns our lives… look at all this… how much are we missing?”

“Oh come on Silas, you don’t really believe that.”

Dawson was met with static and then deafening silence.

“Silas?”

Dawson got his rig out and tried not to panic. He climbed some rubble to see his partner faced away from him, his gaze fixed upon the roiling ocean beyond. Dawson got closer and called out to him before he realized something was wrong. Silas had removed his helmet. He stared out to sea with naked eyes and was frozen there. Dawson ran and shouted for him to put his helmet on. He reached Silas, salty streaks cut deep creases in Silas’ face. Dawson quickly grabbed the helmet and reattached it to his partner’s rig.

“What are you doing!?” Dawson was out of breath, “Do you have a death wish?”

“I.. I’ve never smelled the sea, or felt the air on my face out here before.”

“Yeah-- because it is poisonous, Silas. It is against the rules, the--”

“Don’t you get it?"

Silas reached out and unclasped Dawson’s helmet, fury in his eyes. The icy air blasted Dawson and he stumbled away from the cliff’s edge. His thoughts raced past his short panicked breaths. Is this how I die? Silas killed me! Why would he do that? Am I dying? Is this what dying feels like? He clutched his chest, the silver locket tightly in his grip as he thought of his family. He waited for the end.

Minutes passed. The deep rumble of the sea caressed him into calm as its waves assailed the rocky shore. Another minute passed. His breaths became longer to match its tempo. Slow, shivering gulps of air as the waves churned.

“They lied, Dawson.”

“Why? Why would you even try?”

“You tell me.” He gestured at one of the rocky paths that snaked down the cliffside to meet with the water. Dozens, upon dozens of footprints crisscrossed through the silt. Some old, some newer, of various sizes carved out a trail, hidden from the eyes of the Chairman. Silas let out an uneasy sigh, “it made me wonder what else they lied about.”

“B-but, what? Wh-- how? This means--”

A high pitched whine of rotors interrupted his thought, as a drone zipped into view. The chimeric cameras clicked and whirred between two large rotors as the machine eyes of the state gazed judgement upon them.

“Urgent: Deviants reported on Route Three.” The drone chirped and a shrill whistle emitted from the machine, “All Scrappers, this is Chairman Miner, here: regardless of your sponsor, you will be rewarded your annual bonus immediately for the capture of the traitors on Route Three. Your hard work is always rewarded in Pacific City-- but decide to be a shiftless cur and you will be punished acc--”

Dawson hurled a small stone at the drone and it crashed to the ground, “Go now! I can lead them away from here.”

“Wait, what!?”

“Listen, you were right,” He grabbed Silas by the shoulders, “we don’t know what else they lied about. People aren’t supposed to be able to live out here, but here we are talking without helmets on, next to a bunch of footprints of people who we didn’t know existed. They’re out there somewhere. Other people. If we tell the City who knows what the Chairman will do-- but I know what you’ll do-- so go.”

“What about--”

“No ‘buts’ just go. Go before they send another drone and find you too.”

Dawson turned and ran to the rig. He snapped the helmet back on his head and turned to the sea. Silas stood there frozen. He gave his partner a thumbs up and the slag cat roared to life. Silas clamored down the trail and out of sight as his partner rocketed back in the direction of Pacific City. He had only driven for minutes when two trails of smoke appeared on the horizon.

Dawson imagined the two rigs plastered with smiling faces of industry giants that were on route to meet him head on.

He imagined the carnage of steel and flesh when they rammed each other at full force.

His thoughts wandered to the image of the woman he married and that dangled around his neck.

For what?

He took his hands off of the steering yoke and stared at them blankly. Ten years. I have hauled scrap for ten years. All for what? To be lied to? Treated like a kid who wouldn't understand?

"No."

A thought that became word, and then became defiance before it morphed into thunderous enmity.

"No."

Dawson powered on the rig's primary drills, and wheeled it around until he faced down Pacific City.

"NO!"

He unclipped his helmet and jammed it into the gas pedal. The machine roared loudly, and hurtled toward the walls. Dawson popped open the door, held his breath and leapt. He hit the ground hard, and rolled out of the way of the behemoth. His slag cat was already well past him and headed for the City with malice. He watched the other two plumes of smoke chase after it as he jogged back toward the trail where he left Silas.

The smell of the salt and sand kicked up in his nose and stung, but he was happy. For what he realized was the first time, he made a choice that mattered.