Free Wasteland Wonderland - Part 1 by James Harden

opens the long briefcase. Contained
within the briefcase are a bunch of parts which she puts together
like a jigsaw puzzle. Bit by bit. Piece by piece.
    And in a few short minutes, she’s got herself
a sniper rifle. There’s no scope, but down here, we’re not going to
need a scope.
    “Do you know how to use that thing?” I ask,
completely underestimating her.
    “Yeah. One of these bastards taught me. He
was bored. Figured he teach a pretty young girl how to fire a large
and ugly weapon. The first time I fired it, the recoil nearly
killed me, nearly took my head off. I cried. He laughed.
Bastard.”
    “I’m sorry…”
    “Don’t be sorry. Because now I know how to
use this,” she says, shouldering the sniper rifle, checking the
barrel. “I now know how to kill a human being.”
    I nod my head and I’m smiling. “Then let’s
get to it.”
    I tell her to hide behind a billboard on the
upper level of the subway. A billboard that advertises the
‘Trans-continental Hyperloop’. What an age to be alive, I think to
myself. Anyway, I tell Angel it’ll be warmer up there. And that she
won’t be used to the heat. But she’ll have a great line of sight, a
great vantage point. I tell her to use a knife to cut a hole in the
billboard. Cut a few holes.
    I tell her, “Don’t point the barrel through
the hole. They’ll be able to see it. Hang back. Line them up. Take
your time. And remember, it’ll be hot up there, even more so than
right here, even though we’re literally only one level lower.”
    She tells me she can handle it. She tells me
she won’t let me down. She hands me two grenades and takes her
rucksack and wishes me good luck.
    Angel makes her way up the stairs, makes her
way to her sniper’s nest.
    I turn my head to the side. I can hear them
walking up the dark tunnel, marching, noisy and arrogant. It’s time
to start killing, time to get revenge for Ruby.
    For the guy who poured me my drinks at that
sleazy ass bar.
    For Meryl, the sweet old librarian who knew
my name even though I didn’t know hers. She knew my name because
she knew everyone’s name. She kept that place open, kept it from
falling into waste. She warned us, cut the power, gave us a chance
to escape. I know this act of defiance and bravery cost her dearly.
I know it cost Meryl her life. The Enforcers would not have
hesitated putting a bullet in her brain. Her brain, within it, the
knowledge and wisdom of the Library she kept alive.
    Now it’s all gone. Dead and gone.
    Maybe they didn’t use a bullet. Maybe they
didn’t want to waste one on an old lady. Maybe they just used a
knife. I’m picturing all the ways that Meryl could’ve died. And I’m
getting pretty worked up. And it’s getting hard to focus.
    And I need to focus.
    Killing an army is hard work.
    “Hector! Lay down your weapons. Get on the
ground. Put your hands behind your head. And no one will get
hurt.”
    “Okay. Sure. I’ll do that.”
    Idiots. Why are they wasting their breath?
Haven’t they learnt their lesson?
    The grenades that Angel gave me are not
regular grenades. They’re not explosive frag grenades. One is a
flash-bang grenade and the other is a smoke grenade. I pull the
pins out with my teeth. I spit them on the ground and I throw the
flash-bang into the subway tunnel.
    The flash-bang is louder and brighter than I
ever imagined. It’s the kind of brightness you’d expect from an
exploding star, or a few thousand nuclear warheads detonating all
at once. The flash-bang moves into a strobe light mode and all hell
and chaos erupts. I see the Enforcers scatter like roaches, taking
cover.
    They return fire. Well, they try to. Their
aim is sporadic and completely inaccurate. At the very back of
their pathetic group, I think I see the Overseer. He’s standing in
the background, standing in the dark tunnel.
    He’s not bothering to hide or take cover. I
can’t be certain, but it looks like he is smiling.
    The flashing continues.
    On and