Free Mutant City by Steve Feasey

made, stepped into it and fell. The loud shriek he let out brought Brick hurrying over, asking the teenager over and over what had happened. Hissing through gritted teeth against the waves of pain, Rush was unable to answer at first, and when he did, he was short with the big guy, telling him to back off and leave him alone. Brick made camp, bringing covers over to Rush and telling him everything was going to be all right. But lying wrapped in the rough blanket, Rush knew how far from the truth this was. The slightest movement of his ankle sent waves of agony shooting through him, and there was no doubt in his mind that the bone was broken. That being the case, he would almost certainly die out here. Shivering beneath the thin covers, and trying to block out the pain, he eventually fell asleep.
    The next morning, Rush woke to discover his ankle was fine. He flexed his foot, stunned to discover no hint of pain. Getting to his feet, he tentatively tested it a few times, and then stood fully upright, leaning so it bore all his weight. There was nothing to suggest he’d injured it in any way the previous day. He gawped stupidly down at the limb, shaking his head in astonishment.
    ‘Better?’ Brick asked.
    ‘Wh . . . ? Er, yeah. Better.’
    ‘Good.’
    They set off in the direction of the mountains again, Rush in the lead and the humming Brick bringing up the rear. Walking like this, the younger mutant didn’t notice how the big man now had a distinct limp. It didn’t last long, and by the time they stopped again to rest, there was no sign anything had ever been wrong.
    They carried on for two more uneventful days. Five days in total had passed since they’d set out from the outpost, and now the pair had finally reached the foothills of the mountain range they were headed towards. The vast rope of mountains stretched out as far as the eye could see in both directions, as if the earth had spewed up a natural barrier to stop travellers from reaching whatever might lie on the other side. From way off, the two had selected a particular peak as the one they would cross; it was lower than those around it, and unlike its neighbours, there was no indomitable-looking summit reaching up into the clouds. Instead, it appeared as if the uppermost part of their mountain had been neatly sliced off with a knife. ‘Like the top of an egg!’ Brick had said.
    If Rush had had a sense of impending doom before, it was positively crushing now the mountains loomed ominously over them. He took to stopping every few minutes to scan the ridges and bluffs with his telescope, looking for signs of movement or the flash of reflected sun on a spyglass pointed back in their direction. When Brick asked him what he was looking at, or bugged him to let him have a go with the telescope, Rush would snap back at him or simply ignore him altogether. When they struck camp at night the forebodings of danger were so bad that he was unable to sleep, imagining that whatever might have been watching them all day would use the cover of darkness to creep down and cut their throats. This lack of sleep did nothing to improve his mood, and neither did Brick’s constant tuneless humming, which was slowly beginning to drive him mad.
    The morning they were to begin their ascent proper – the low foothills finally giving way to tougher, rockier terrain that they were forced to scramble over – Rush opened his eyes to the sight of Brick grinning at him from across the ashes of the previous night’s fire.
    ‘Morning,’ the big guy said, poking a stick into the grey-and-black mess. Having consumed all their dried meat, and failing to find anything to hunt in this desolate wasteland, there was no food for them to break their fast.
    Rush ignored him, rubbing his eyes and getting up to stretch his legs and back. He looked up and groaned at the thought of starting such a climb on an empty stomach. It didn’t look too bad from down here, but there were a couple of areas higher