The Vulture

Maria stands in line next to her mother. Both are as disheveled looking as the rest within the small refuge. Countless days of filth coat their skin and tattered clothes. Hunger fills the being of every person standing in the food line. She is one of the unlucky children who are unfortunate enough to remember the old world. Now in her seventeenth year, not a day has passed that has not been filled with its memory.

The line inches forward as Maria glances across the way to see three men sitting in the patchy grass, bowls in hand. White-hot rage fills her body at the sight of the men. She looks beside her to her mother to see if she notices. Her mother poorly feigns a forward-looking focus. “You’re not going to say anything?” Maria says quietly, but forcefully. Her mother’s face curls up. “And what would you have me do?” she retorts. Maria just looks off and away into the distance. She’d had this argument with her mother countless times, always ending with the same bitter truth of their plight.

The line shuffles on and the two receive their meal. Afterward, they make their way to their section of the camp. Sewn-together scraps of cloth make up rows of makeshift tents within the camp. They make their way inside their enclosure and take a seat in the middle of the tent, old blankets comprising the floor. Maria could not look at her mother nor her mother at her. The embarrassment and helplessness of the situation had to pass before such communication could be attempted. Soon, night came, and the camp dwindled down for sleep. Little noise ever came from its inhabitants for risk of attracting unwanted guests, but also because there was little worth the breath.

The following day saw a repetition of the daily chores for Maria’s colony. One of Maria’s tasks for the day was to search the sparsely wooded area that lay roughly three miles from the encampment for fruit. This was her favorite chore as it not only allowed her to view something other than the desolate, dirt-covered wasteland that now covered most of the world but to also enjoy the separation from the tense atmosphere of the camp. Sometimes she would spend hours “looking for fruit”, wishing never to have to leave.

Maria gathered her makeshift knapsack and headed out towards the woods. The trek alone was a relief for her, save the occasional threat from wildlife. For such instances, she made sure to always keep a blade strapped securely to her thigh. The day’s pilgrimage was unfortunately cut short due to her knapsack revealing a sizeable hole Maria had missed. Frustrated, she turned back to find another suitable fruit-carrying pouch.

As she came upon the camp, she noticed an odd sensation running from her chest to her stomach. As she approached her and her mother’s tent, she saw the last thing she ever wanted to see again. Two vultures of men stood outside their tent, the same she saw in the food line the previous day. And Maria knew where the third was.

At the sight of this, her stomach turned into a pool of acid. Rage mixed with helplessness churned and mixed inside her to produce a paralyzed state within her. She slowly approached the tent and as she did, so the third man calmly exited from underneath the tent. He caught eyes with Maria, thrown slightly off guard by her early reappearance, to which he then gave her a vomit-inducing smile. He turned to the other two of his party and spoke, “Come on boys, you two can finish this up later. Looks like the doe is done early”. The three left as Maria just glared at them, wishing her anger could somehow strike them dead from a distance. Once they were far enough from the tent, Maria ran towards it, flinging open the front flap. “What was that!?” she screamed at her partially undressed mother. Her mother recoiled in surprise and horror. “You know what it is Maria,” she spoke in a quiet, dejected voice. “I can’t believe-“That what?” her mother interjected. “That I would do anything for you? For us? How would you like it if I left us to starve like everyone else eventually will? What kind of mother would I be?” she yelled in defense. Maria just glared back at her mother. “You know who won’t starve?” she asked. Her mother just looked back into her eyes, tears now filling the bottoms of them, threatening to pour out from the thin lids. “Them,” said Maria pointing towards the exit of the tent.

Her mother could not say anything. She couldn’t muster the reason of strength it would take to say a word, much less a sentence. What could she say? Seeing her mother’s weakness, and theirs as a whole, Maria charged out of the tent, racing back towards the woods. “Maria!” screamed her mother. She didn’t listen, just took off as fast as her malnourished body would allow her to with tears in her eyes and pain in her heart.

She reached the tree line in record time. Once home, she dropped to her knees, beginning to release her torment with a wail. She screamed and cried and cursed existence for their plight. Once the flood of energy in her began to dwindle down to a baseline, she opened her eyes slightly. Beautiful trees were scattered in front of her and grass spotted where she knelt, increasing in density the closer it got to the tree line. Taking in the scene, she dropped her head, attempting to settle down further, until the sound of footsteps caught her attention.

Maria perked up quickly at this. Had one of the men followed her? She scanned the area for signs of the threat. Her eyes darted from tree to tree, the sound of a nearby river clouding her auditory senses. She stood to her feet and began to cautiously tread forward, still scanning her surroundings. ‘Snap’, she heard this time at the sound of a twig cracking. She whirled her head around, still seeing nothing. She inched closer to the tree line, her hand reaching for her knife. She was close to the river when suddenly she felt an overwhelming signal to spin around. She turned to see a figure standing no less than twenty yards from her.

Maria froze with shock. What appeared before was as much a monster as it was a man. It stood at roughly six feet tall, with military-grade boots, tattered tan pants, and a dark green vest. Covered its face was an old World War II-era gas mask, with a long funnel dangling from where its nose and mouth would be. In his right hand, he wielded a long-bladed bayonet. She unsheathed her knife yet knew she had no power within her to fight, the fear was too overpowering.

Silence covered the scene. It was as if all of nature suddenly stopped at what was happening, it too afraid. The man simply stood where he was, slightly hunched, fixated on her. Maria didn’t budge a muscle fiber as she stood frozen. The moments passed like eternities as Maria’s thoughts raced at breakneck speed. Her heart pounded from inside her chest. Her eyes dilated in fear. Maria panted from the speed of her heart, only drawing in quarter breaths. And suddenly, in a moment’s flash, the man charged at her.

Maria’s mind scattered for what to do. In the mere few seconds, it would take to reach her, she had to decide what move to make. But she couldn’t. Her mind not functioning properly, her body took over and began to move her backward rapidly. The man gained ground quicker than any deer she had seen and was already upon her. He reared his right hand back, ready to plunge the bayonet into her body, and then swung. As the blade traveled through the air towards her neck, something caught Maria mid-step. Suddenly, she was stumbling backward and falling into the cold flowing water.

For a split second, she was disoriented. The fluid crashed into her, drenching her in what was surely radioactive water. She attempted to keep her head above the water as it whisked her away. The man hurriedly chased her along the riverbank. Coming as a saving grace, a wall of trees and a steep slope in the river cut him off before he could make any further attempt. A rush of gratitude and joy rushed over her and she cared no more for the furious current that was carrying her away. Her ecstasy was short-lived however as an unseen boulder jutting out across the edge of the river rapidly approached. Before Maria could react and attempt to shifter her momentum, she collided with it, rendering her unconscious.

The soft splashes of lapping water aroused Maria. She began to slowly open her eyes, a blurry vision of the river and surrounding forest appearing before her. Remembering where she was and what was occurring, she realized she had been saved by another large rock lying in the path of the river. She began to move slowly and felt a sharp pain shoot throughout her right arm, most likely broken from the impact. After struggling with her good arm up and out of the water, she jumped from atop the rock to the safety of the grass.

“How long was I out?” she asked herself, rapidly scanning her surroundings once more. It was now dark out and nighttime was almost fully upon her. Exhausted, wet, and petrified, she made her way towards the woods. Before she could make it more than a few meters, she saw him.

The man had caught up to her and was now fifty yards from her. This time he did not hesitate. He charged at her with a demonic stride. Maria reached for the knife on her leg, but it was missing, lost in the current. She felt a moment of panic. What could be done? In the short moments she had left, Maria thought of the camp, her mother, and the helplessness she had felt her whole life. And in the last moments, she finally found her response. Backpedaling, she looked across her shoulder towards the river, stopping just before its edge. The man was now just a few yards in front of her. She closed her eyes, said goodbye to her mother, and just as the monster reached her, grappled his armed hand, casting the both of them into the river. The two crashed into it with ferocity and were carried away.

The two tumbled clawed their way down the river, straight towards the oncoming waterfall. Maria noticed the oncoming drop and braced herself. She gave one last glance to the sky before the end came.

The two were cast over the edge, bodies flailing like rag dolls. A cascade of rushing water pummeled them deep down towards the larger body below. Then, in a flash of a moment, they both were gone. Silence once more filled the air, with nothing but the falling water speaking. After what could have been minutes or hours, something breached the water.

It was a hand at first, grotesquely misshapen and mangled, then next a mouth. Maria gasped for air as she struggled to stay above the water. Using what strength she had left in her broken limbs, she managed to thrust herself towards the edge of the bank and onto the soft grass. She coughed up water mixed with blood as she clamored forward. Unable to believe she was still breathing, she paused and looked up once more towards the night sky. She began to stand upright, knees shaking as she did so. She turned to look back at the water, looking for signs of her pursuer. As she did, something caught her eye, something shiny and metallic. Maria squinted to get a better look at the object. It floated towards her gently, as if self-propelled. Once it reached her, Maria reached out and plucked it from the water. It was a necklace, a golden locket shaped like a heart. Maria opened it to view what lay inside it. There was nothing, just a blank case waiting to be filled. Maria closed the locket and stared at it for another moment. Breathing a sigh, she unclasped the chain, put it around her neck, and made her way back to camp.