Splice

Darkness. That’s what lay before us.

The head of Goneril’s torch were the only light for miles, n’ Ma 'n I could only make out his twisted fingers as they gripped tightly around his wooden candle. Each of Goneril’s four fingers ended in a long pointed nail, black with the dirt that had caked on since his last bath.

None of us had bathed in more cycles than we could keep track of.

We was used to the stench. The smell of our clothes faded away; we was so dehydrated we had ceased sweatin’. Even the foul taste that once lingered in our mouths had been swallowed whole when there was nothin’ left to satiate our famine.

We kept on. When I slept, Goneril gave the torch to Ma, n’ he carried me. When Ma slept, Goneril gave the torch to me, n’ he carried Ma. Goneril never slept.

By the time we reached the end of the line, I had stopped countin’ my sleep cycles.

Goneril lifted Ma up first. I held the torch as I watched Ma disappear into the darkness above. After a brief moment of clangin’, Goneril took the torch from me n’ set it on the floor. He grabbed me with his long fingers n’ lifted me high above his head where I blindly reached for somethin’ to hold onto. A hard bar found its way into my hand. I hoisted myself up n’ I found another bar, another rung of the ladder. I began to climb. I looked below me n’ saw the flame swallow the entire stick that had been Goneril’s torch. Goneril leaped n’ the sound of man on metal meant he had found the ladder. The three of us climbed on into the black.

If my arms were tired, I can’t ‘magine how Ma musta felt. It was a comfort to know that Goneril was below to catch me if I fell, but I wasn’t certain he could hold both Ma ‘n me at once.

I heard a loud yelp above my head, meanin’ Ma had found the top of the ladder. ‘Spite her best efforts, Ma was stopped by somethin’. I carefully climbed up myself n’ felt around. My hands found a large wheel, n’ in my mind’s eye I saw a hatch that could be turned n’ pushed open. I tried with all my strength, but was unable to open the hatch while maintainin’ a steady hand on the ladder, you follow me? So Goneril had to come up n’ try his go at the hatch.

It was gettin’ cramped by the top of the ladder, n’ I scooted down to make room for my brother. Goneril had little trouble n’ was able to turn the hatch with ease. The night’s light flooded our tunnel as Goneril pushed the gate open, n’ he pulled Ma up through the exit with him. I followed, hungry for more of the faint light that filled the room we had entered up into.

As our eyes adjusted, we gathered a better awareness of our surroundins. It looked as though this room hadn’t been touched for family cycles; a thick layer of dust coated what seemed to be rows of small beds. It reminded me of the compound, the compound we had fled from. ‘Cept this place was not bein’ managed by the silver men, n’ there were no tests or xperiments or nothin’ here. There was nobody. There was nothin’. Nothin’ ‘cept for beds n’ clothes...N’ books in a tongue Ma nor me nor Goneril could make no sense of.

We searched the room anyway. No food n’ no water, but Goneril found a chain. Not a big one like the ones from the compound, but a little one. A little tiny one, couldn’t fit around much more than his neck. The thin silver chain was spliced with a metal box. Ma called it a “Heart.”

I had seen a heart before. At the compound. This was not a heart. This was more so two upside down tear drops side by side; it was two camel humps sittin’ upon the letter “V”. Ma hadn’t spoken in many cycles, yet she was sayin’ it clearly: “Heart.”

Inside this “heart” shaped box, was what had to be a very detailed paintin’. A still image as clear as glass, n’ yet what I saw I could not explain.

In this tiny heart, in this tiny paintin’, I saw a woman. Or at least I ‘spect she was a woman. She had stuff comin’ out of her head. Long, stringy, worms that reminded me of another paintin’ I had once seen at the compound. Her face was different than any real person I had ever seen before, she was pale, the color of the clouds. I know it sounds like I’m fibbin’ but I swear it. Skin the color of the clouds. Strings comin’ out of her head. Lips the color of the sun. Most unusual of all, she had somethin’ in the middle of her face. Above those bright, bright lips, instead of a pair of nares, the woman had a large growth protrudin’ from her face, n’ it suited her, as though the gods had put it there. The woman were pretty, ‘spite lookin’ like a freak.

Goneril looked at it too. The growth on the woman in the paintin’ in the heart on the chain gave her the eerie ‘semblance of bein’ one of the silver men, ‘cept she were white, n’ a woman. Or at least I ‘spect she were a woman. (For all I know, she had five fingers on each hand.) ‘Spite my better judgment, I couldn’t help but ‘spect this woman had been more than just the makin’s of someones ‘magination. I believe she were a real live person once, just lookin’ a little different from Ma n’ Goneril n’ me. I know Goneril thought the same. We are brothers.

We left the room of beds, n’ I was happy to do so. Ma had found comfort in the small chain n’ the tiny woman, so we let her carry it. We left the rest of the dust behind.

The surface was desolate, n’ our bodies grew weak with each passin’ cycle. We knew Ma weren’t gonna make it.

We was on a road surrounded by tall towerin’ piles of rooms. We didn’t dare go into any of the big ones, for fear they’d cave in on us, but the shallow rooms were good shelter for the cold n’ the bugs. Just like my Pa told me stories about as a kid, the bugs were brutal beasts (bigger than a barkeeth) n’ you could never tell the docile from the deadly. There were 6 legged flyin’ stingers the size of one of the compound’s cantaloupes, n’ hundred legged crawlers the length of Ma’s left leg. But that meant there was still life up there.

We searched the rooms for 7 cycles, but found no food. We’d’ve been dead for certain if Goneril hadn’t found that great pool of brown water. We drank until our toes were wet.

Water weren’t enough. We wasn’t used to the sunlight; it sucked us dry. Ma weren’t gonna make it, we knew that. Ma knew it too.

Goneril carried her at all times now, I no longer wanted to sleep anyway on account of the bugs. ‘Spite my pleadin’ Goneril told us we only had one option. He instructed me to find the sharpest poker I could, so I searched the dust until I found a suitable weapon. I chose a forked bar of scrap that I tore from the side of one of those old rooms. We set Ma down in the room of beds so she could rest.

Me n’ Goneril set off toward the edge of the brown water to wait. Just like he said, it weren’t long before some of them showed up. Me with my pipe, n’ Goneril holdin’ a large stone. As if it were my one purpose, I began stabbin’ my stick at the swarm of buzzers. ‘Spite their monstrous size, they was hard to catch, each dippin’ n’ spittin’ at me with every swing. I weren’t too feared of ‘em, but I were more feared than Goneril. Goneril heaved great stones in the air like they was pebbles, n’ he nabbed two of the biggest suckers I’d seen.

He signaled for me to watch the ground, n’ soon the crawlers were comin’ up from the dust, ‘cause they smelled the death.

We smashed and smashed and smashed until the dirt below us was stained with a thick red paste of what had been big bugs only minutes before.

We brought it back to Ma. Goneril seemed right dejected that we smashed 'em up so bad, but I can’t ‘magine the bugs could’ve been much better whole. We had no kiln, so we was eatin’ ‘em raw. The red paste that had once been several giant insects tasted worse than I expected. Goneril’s supper came back up as soon as he got it down. The sight of that brought my own meal to the floor once more. Only Ma were able to keep the paste inside.

If the brown water hadn’t made us ill, the bug paste weren’t helpin’. My brother n’ me maintained some strength, but Ma was unfit to leave the bed. Me n’ Goneril took turns guardin’ her slumber from the hungry monsters that lurked in the night. Another cycle or two, n’ what had once been the dusty hall of beds was now the pasty hall of beds, n’ it were covered with that same dark red sludge we had tried eatin’ cycles prior.

After what musta been at least a full moon cycle since the compound, Ma went in her sleep.

Exhaustion caught up to us. Goneril n’ I looked at Ma with greedy jealous eyes. She looked peaceful at last. Her brown wrinkled skin sagged slightly, but Ma looked like she was only sleepin’. I took the small chain from around her neck, n’ draped it over my own head.

There was nothin’ left for us up here. Neither Goneril nor I spoke much as we made our way to the hatch. The strength Goneril once had was gone at last. He could not carry Ma back down with us. We was gonna have to leave her. At least she saw sunlight, I remember thinkin’ to myself. I didn’t have much energy for talkin’ so there were a whole lotta thinkin’.

We said bye to Ma. That was somethin’ we actually spoke aloud. ‘Sides that, we was silent. Figure the bugs has gotten to her by now, figure she’s joined the dust.

Goneril couldn’t open the hatch. His once unstoppable arms were like useless jelly as they wormed about the wheel helplessly. I tried my go at the hatch. I tugged n’ turned n’ pulled n’ wrenched until the faint squeak signalled the hatch was ready to raise. Goneril helped me heave the metal lid open. Below, the first few rungs of the ladder were illuminated by the extra specks of starlight that had seeped in from outside. One by one, we clambered into the hole.

Goneril descended below me as I watched him disappear from view.

I used my last precious moments of sight to offer a final glance at the tiny woman in the paintin’ in the “heart” on the chain around my neck. She was smilin’. Hadn’t seen one of those since I’d been a child. I wondered what life had been like for her. What troubles she faced. If she had once slept in the hall of beds, before the dust, before the bugs claimed the surface. I wondered about the woman as I climbed down, deep into the black below, back towards the compound, back the way we came, with Goneril beneath me, onward to our next meal.

Darkness. That’s what lay before us.