Free Deadland: Untold Stories of Alice in Deadland (Alice, No. 5) by Mainak Dhar Page A

the wall and peered over it.
    A single Biter shuffled along, seemingly oblivious to the
many guns that were now pointed at her. It was an old woman, with long gray
hair flowing over her bare torso that was covered with blood and gore. She wore
torn trousers and kept snapping her jaw at something.
    'Our boys swept the area just fifteen minutes ago and it was
clear. Now this freak shows up out of nowhere.'
    'Do you think those stories of underground Biter bases are
real?'
    Alice shivered in spite of herself as she overheard the men
talking near her. Biters were bad enough, but Biters with enough sense and
guile to hide in bases under the ground and then emerge to strike were
terrifying. Alice had seen Biters for many years, and they seemed to be exactly
what they appeared at first sight—brutish monsters with no intelligence. No,
the stories of their bases had to just that—stories.
    The Biter seemed to be ignoring the settlement, but then
someone coughed and her head snapped towards them. Even at this distance, Alice
could see the blood dripping from her mouth.
    'This one's fed recently.'
    The man next to her had also seen it. Seeing a Biter never
failed to make Alice feel a mixture of hatred and revulsion. Hatred because
these were the monsters that had made her people live in so much fear, and
revulsion because of how dirty, how horrible they seemed. She felt for the gun
at her belt, but one of the men whispered to her.
    'No point wasting bullets on this one. Let her roam, and
she'll pass us or fall into the moat and we can finish her later.'
    As the Biter came closer and hissed at the people ringing
the wall, someone threw a stone that hit her on the leg. She roared in anger
and came towards them. Another stone hit her on the head, and she stumbled to
the ground, only to get back up and come at them, her jaws snapping. Two of the
men were now taunting her and shouting at her to come closer. The Biter roared
and hissed in anger at them and was coming closer.
    Alice felt a tug on her arm. It was her father. Gladwell
pulled her off the platform and led her away from the wall. They could now hear
cheering as the Biter fell into the moat.
    'Fighting to protect one's own is one thing, but being cruel
for the sake of it is another.'
    Alice didn't always understand what her father said, but she
was sure it must have been something important. Still, this line of thinking
didn't make sense to her.
    'But, Daddy, Biters are the enemy.'
    Gladwell looked down into his daughter's eyes.
    'Yes, Alice. They are, and when they threaten us, I'll be
the first to destroy them. But there's no bravery in jeering at them from a
distance. There's no bravery in butchering one for sport. That doesn't show how
brave you are, it shows how weak you are.'
    Alice nodded, though she wasn't very sure if she had got it
after all.
    That afternoon was unarmed combat training with Jones. All
the other kids were at least ten years old, and most were bigger than her but
Alice had got a significant head start, having started her training at the age
of seven. Jones liked to keep his training simple, because as he liked to say,
'No Biter's yet got a black belt in Karate,' so the focus was on quick
take-downs and fighting off multiple Biter attackers. Today, Alice was sparring
with Junior. He seemed to have grown more in the last two years than in all his
preceding years and now, despite being only around thirteen years old, towered
over Alice, and was as tall as some of the grown men in the settlement.
    So far, Alice had sparred only with kids her age, and she
had been pestering Jones to let her spar with the bigger kids. How else would
she be ready to go out on patrols, to fight battles? Well, it looked like Jones
had decided to grant her wish today by pairing her with Junior, who was not
only bigger, but reputed to be a real brawler.
    Junior looked down at Alice.
    'Ready, pipsqueak?'
    The tone was still there, but the smirk had long gone. Gone
that day two years