Zed Land
Chapter 1: Phillip
His heart pounding and steam billowing from his mouth, Phillip didn't stop the relentless sprint which he had affixed himself into. He would keep it up until he hit the next group of houses. He was familiar with one of them and knew a good enough hiding place should the Fencers get wind. This wasn't nearly his first trip into The Zone and he was confident in his evasion techniques. Thump-thump-thump-thump. He wanted to fix his eyes on that house, to measure the distance and count the steps to it, but Phillip knew the foolishness of tunnel vision; He kept his head moving side to side, his eyes opened wide despite the frigid air torturing them. If there was something to be seen in this light, he'd be damned to miss it.
Thirty seconds latter found him with his back against the inside of what used to be a child's bedroom sucking deep breaths, trying to pay back the oxygen debt. He struggled to keep his hands up and over his head like he old track coach taught him, but, of course, there is a powerful difference between running to beat a record and running to beat a bullet. He thought about that for a moment while slowly sliding down a wall with a mural of dinosaurs in ridiculous outfits and colors on it; There was no doubt in this teen's mind that the Forbidden Zone Border Patrol (the Fencers) would bring arms against him if they saw him sneaking across The Fence. He had seen them to it before.
It was a little under four years back when Phillip was just a kid greenhorn looking for excitement and cash. The Industry wasn't nearly as popular back then; He had only heard of it from his older friends that spoke of it more as a test of manhood than a profit machine. The idea of impressing even them with such an exploit was to enticing to pass up, but Phillip could have never done it alone. Few of his friends were as enthralled with the idea, however, until one of the other boys overheard him trying to talk a friend into it. Him name was Rocco, but everyone just called him Rock. Philip and Rock didn't know each other very well, but neither expected to find someone with such a crazy passion.
The next day, just as the sun was dipping over the mountains, they crawled up to the embankment that was the beginning of The Fence. The Fence itself was actually a multi-layered security device that carried the impression of technological simplicity; It just looked like a series of fences with barbed wire at the top, not dissimilar to those around the old prisons that seem to spring up from the desert every few hundred miles around. This was, of course, a facade, though, at the time, Phillip and Rock couldn't have imagined the elaborate devices that protected the integrity of the border. They had approached The Fence cautiously at first, but after they had crossed most of the thirty feet or so that separated the embankment to the barriers at a snails pace, they eased up and became more foolhardy. Rock had nicked a pair of bolt cutters from the hardware store and they had used these to, carefully, at first, for fear of electrocution, cut small holes in the three chain-link fences and crawled through, leaving their tool there to be collected later.
There was a seductive thrill that sent shivers down Phillip's spine. Hell, it still did. They had done it; They were inside unmolested. Phillip and Rock had looked at each other, a few feet inside The Fence, with quizzical looks. “What do we do now?” Phillip had broken the silence.
Rock shrugged, trying to look unafraid, “I don't know. Maybe we should check out those houses or something. No one will believe us unless we bring something back that proves we were here.” His voice was unwavering, but the look in his eye told the truth: this idea mortified him.
The Zone had quite a legend built up around it, though no one agreed why it was forbidden in the first place; The explanations ranged from nuclear fallout from a bomb to a secret government/UFO base. One kid was dead certain it was vampires, though he tended to blame vampires for everything. It was kind of an obsession. No matter why is was forbidden, however, every child had been raised with the same lecture: Don't go into The Zone under any circumstances. Bad things happen to kids that go into The Zone.
Now, here they were, in The Zone with night rapidly onsetting and Rock wanted to go break into houses. Phillip knew what he was supposed to do; Rocco wanted him to talk him out of it and look the cowered. “Okay, let's do that. Remember, though: I have to get home in a couple hours and I'll catch hell if I'm late.” Phillip wouldn't have any of it.
Rock sighed and started towards the little cluster of houses. They were strangely detached, as though they were part of some suburban housing community, but there were not other structures around them; There was only a road that stretched out towards a small shopping area half a mile or so away.
Phillip had pulled out and flipped open his knife, making Rock jump a bit. Phillip had carried it since a bully had cracked his skull with a bat and put him into a coma for a week (school was a bit of a rough place), so wielding it in a moment of discomfort wasn't that odd of an event. However, something felt different this time and he didn't like it.
They had crept up to the first house silently. When they tried the door, it was locked, however, so they then moved to the next one, which was similarly locked. After trying the last one with the same result, Rock motioned toward the first house. “There's a window open above the door there,” he had whispered.
“Think you can boost me up onto that little piece of roof? I think I can get to it from there,” Phillip replied.
Rock nodded and, after getting into position, lifted his companion up until Phillip just barely got his stomach onto the corner of the roof, reaching across and grabbing the underside of the the opposite corner and slid himself up.
“I don't think I can pull you up here, Rock,” Phillip whispered over the edge.
“Just come down and unlock the door!”
Phillip shook his head,” No, man, this place gives me the creeps. I'm just going to grab something and jump down so we can get out of here.”
Rock was displeased, but accepted the statement. “Okay, just keep quiet. I'm going to be over here in this nook... ya'know, just in case.”
Phillip smiled and nodded. He was beginning to enjoy Rocco's company. “I'll be back out in a minute,” he said while turning and standing up. He took a step, lost his footing, and fell on his stomach, making a loud scraping noise. He quickly jumped back up and scrambled to press himself against the wall and heard Rock do similar. After a thirty seconds of silence, he finally let out a breath and calmed down. Turning, Philip stepped through the window and into the dark room.
Clicking on the light, he was surprised at how complete the room was. The sheets on the bed were still crumpled from a late morning's rise and some of the make-up bottles were open from use. A thick layer of dust laid over everything and cobwebs hung from every part of the ceiling. Phillip approached the bedside table, picking up a picture frame. After wiping away the dust, he stared at the picture. It was a wedding picture between two very Slavic looking people. The man's hair matched his perfectly pressed black suit and the woman has long, blond hair that completed her wonderfully happy smile. He had looked around, as if to ask permission, before stuffing the picture in his pocket. This would be their evidence.
As he looked back up, something twinkled against the light. Reaching out, Phillip grasped a long stranded pearl necklace. He was amazed at it's elegance and beauty; He had never held something so expensive in his life. He reached back into the box and pulled out a twist of gold and silver chains, some with pendants encrusted with jewels. All of the colors dazzled in his eyes as he played the light over them and he sank into their brilliance.
Suddenly he was shaken from his trance by a loud thumping noise. He quickly shoved as much of the jewelry he could into his pocket and headed for the staircase to leave. Halfway down he stopped when he heard the noise again.
“Where is he then?!” he heard a voice shout outside. It wasn't Rock's.
“He went inside, I swear! Don't do that again, please!” Rocco's voice was cracking and bubbling with tears.
“You better be telling the truth,” was spoken and then two gunshots rang out, startling Phillip so bad he almost fell down the stairs. He heard a wet scrap and then Rock's body slap the ground. That sound would haunt his nightmares for years to come. But the terror was just beginning.
When Phillip snapped back out of shock, he realized the shooter was now kicking at the front door, trying to muscle it open. He stepped backwards, tripped on the stair, then quickly jumped up and turned around, running through the hallway. He burst into a room and shut the door just as he heard the gunman at least break through. Phillip was panicked and looked around for a place to hide. He was in a child's bedroom, but there was only a crib and a few decaying stuffed animals left, none of which were of much use to him.
It was then that he noticed something strange about the far wall, near the corner. He tilted his head a bit and saw that it wasn't flush with the rest of the area. Leaping to it, he pulled off the panel to a hidden storage area, designed for vanity. He quickly shoved everything to one side and pulled the panel back onto it as tight as he could from the inside. Just as it clicked into place, he heard the door to the room swing wide open and impact the wall behind it.
Phillip couldn't see anything as the seal was tight enough to block the invading light. He heard footsteps slowly ease across the room, very wide, methodical steps. It took the murderer only a few seconds to realize the lack of cover in the room, and he was heard stepping back to the door and quickly turning into the hall to ransack another room in his pursuit.
Hiding in his hole, Phillip began to breathe again. He realized the crevice which he was hiding in was actually quite spacious; He could lay fully stretched out, even with the molding boxes of things in there with him. There was nothing much for him to do but wait as he heard his tormentor throw the rest of the house apart. Finally, after was seemed an eternity, Phillip had heard him leave the house and a wave of relief washed over him. He sat there for a while more, perhaps ten minutes, before, carefully, slowly, and silently, he slid the panel off of the hole and crawled out. He didn't dare turn on his light, so he groped in the dark, eventually finding the doorway and slowly, cautious of the decay of the metal hinges and the noise they could make, he had opened the door to the empty hallway.
He eased through the hallway and down the steps, not making a single sound. Stepping into a side room, he chanced a glance through the window. No dice, it was as black as death outside and no sign of a flashlight. He slowly crept to the open front doorway.
On the wall next to the entrance, he saw the blood splatter that had been the top section of Rock's brain and skull. The rest of him lay crumpled next to the stairway, almost sitting in the little open area like a macabre puppet. Phillip did his best, but he couldn't stifle the gasp and then gag that jumped up from his throat. It was at that moment that he heard the crunch of a footstep behind him.
Spinning around quickly, one of his foots slipped and splashed into the pool of Rock's blood on the ground. Staring at him through some strange box (Phillip later realized this was a set of night vision goggles) was the man who had done that to Rocco. He wore military fatigues and patches, but had some strange vest on with dim lights.
The man jumped a bit, being startled, and Phillip threw himself into action. He leaped forward and took the knife still in his hand and plunged it deep into the man's chest, just above the collarbone. It slid in easily and the man lurched back, Phillip following him to the ground. The soldier had had his rifle on his back and the combined weight of the two of them had gotten the wind knocked out of him as well has severely spraining his back.
The advantage was Phillips and he knew it. The image on Rock's exploded skull flashed into his mind and he pulled the knife out only to plunged it back into the man's neck. He pulled it out again and continued to stab at him, the sharp knife only failing to puncture the soldier's bullet-proof vest.
Phillip would never figure out how long or how many times he had stabbed that man, but when he stepped off of him, the man was a bloody and gory wreck. Strangely enough, he was still drawing breath when Phillip left him there, though he was completely unconscious. He had taken the man's pistol and spare magazine in a moment of clarity that realized he had walked out in the middle of a conversation the soldier was having with someone else on the radio. He knew more would be coming very soon.
Phillip would never figure out how he got out of there. That night he had to dodge helicopters, jeeps, and even a dog or two. But he did get out of there, though not unscathed. In his mad rush to get back under the chain-link fences, he had slid his hand across the bolt cutters and ripped a large gash in it. When he had arrived at home, he stashed the gun under some loose bricks in front of his house and proceeded in to a very worried mother. He explained to her that he had been playing in an old abandoned car and had grabbed the bent metal of the door, thus resulting in the cut and the multitude of blood that covered his clothes. And, of course, she believed him, because it would have been a much more believable story than the truth, anyways.
Rocco was the last friend Phillip ever made. He never showed the picture to anyone, never felt it was worth proving his exploits. And he never told anyone Rock's fate. As far as most people were concerned, he was just an orphan kid who decided to run into the desert night and never come back. Few missed him.
Phillip frowned at the memory. He had spent so many years trying to forget that night, trying to not remember the twist of stomach at the image of Rocco's destroyed head, or the satisfyingly easy slip of the knife into the soldier's chest. He had told himself so many times that he hadn't killed the man; He had delusions of a him being all patched and perfect again, but even he knew it was ludicrous.
Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out the now worn and folded up picture again. He looked at those two people, so happy and loving and not just for each other; They loved him, too. They were his family, his only companion. Even when his mom died by pickling herself, they were there for him. Their smiles became frowns when he had it the roughest and they congratulated him on every success.
He shook his head and glanced back down before pocketing the picture again. This room always made him remember that night. It was always the first stop into The Zone for him and he always felt safest there.
Phillip was tired and he considered sleeping in the cubby hole that he had grown so fond of, but decided against it. He would just pick up some instant coffee in the natural food store down the road. He had already ransacked the three houses here and the stores' food supply was beginning to run thin. In a few more incursions he would have to finally pick a new entry point.
He shook his head again. Those days are long ahead of him and he needed to focus on the now. And what he had to do now was get up and get past the patrol range.
Chapter 2: Reckless Abandon
The flame from the fire was warm against the night air. It seemed winter got so much colder every year in what used to be a tropical paradise.
