The three of them stayed in the bunker for a long while. A day after the food ran out, Krav’s stomach growled loudly, and he determined that the only thing to do now was to eat Mac or leave the bunker.

  “What do you think?” he asked Rufus, but the skull had gone inanimate in the boy’s sobriety. “Oh yeah, you only talk when I’m high.” He patted Rufus on the forehead and strapped him to his waist.

  “I think we should get out of here if you’re feeling better,” Mac said. She had filled her satchel to the brim with goodies from the hidden treasure trove. She even took the zerker just in case. If anything, it could buy them a hot meal when they found another town.

  They ascended the ladder and struggled with the hatch before freeing themselves from the bunker. Outside, they were lucky to find that the twin suns were receding and a pink hue rose in the east. The heat from the valley warmed their faces as they rose from the cold tomb of the bunker. It was an unusual welcome.

  They checked the map before departing and Krav taught Mac how to tell her easts from her wests. Most of the walk had been uneventful. This span of the valley was unexplored for a reason, but Krav never would have assumed it was because it was so boring. He envisioned deadly creatures and packs of feral raider clans that blocked out the horizon. Instead, it was apparent that the dauntless explorers of the valley would sooner die of hunger and thirst, as would any other being this far out.

  With the boredom came the challenge of filling the time. Krav found a good sized rock and entertained himself by throwing it a few yards ahead and picking it up when they got to it. Mac watched it each time and by the hundredth repetition, snatched the rock and flung it in the opposite direction. It ceased for a while before Krav found another.

  They talked as they went, mostly about the Gordo clan. Mac spilled more than she would have to any random wastelander, telling Krav all about their migratory patterns and raiding tactics. To the boy’s surprise, it was much more complex than he was expecting. So much so that most of it went over his head. When it started to give him a headache, Krav changed the subject.

  “What could he even want with my little brother? Why take him and not Rufus?”

  Mac shrugged. They were about to pass his rock again, but she scooped it up and threw it behind them. “He’s the king of the world. Who the hell am I to ask what he thinks?”

  “Lenny isn’t even strong enough to be a raider! He’s scared of bugs and anything else that moves! He can’t even do this!” Krav drew his axe and launched it forward, watching it spin in the air and land a hundred feet away. Quickly, they reached it and he withdrew it from the sands. “I just don’t get it… Jackmaw wanted me. Why take my brother?”

  “You think you’d like being in the clan?” she smiled. It was all she could think about for the past few days. After the things he’d done in the short time she had known him, Krav felt like a natural raider. A lieutenant worth leading a raiding party even. When she imagined Krav in the clan’s colors, she thought he might look good in a feather skirt and warpaint.

  Now that she had thought about it, she didn’t have friends like this in the clan. They treated her well, of course, no one wants to piss off the lady who makes the drugs. But it was a tentative, polite friendship. They treated her more as the neighborhood pharmacist rather than a friend. For a time, that was enough.

  But no one in the clan had ever kicked over an entire cannibal cult for her. Or chewed their way out of a cage with her. Or got matching teeth. Or snuck into a clan’s hideout in disguise. Or even just sat with her and got high and enjoyed each other’s company. Suddenly, she felt like she had been incredibly lonely for the past six years.

  “Fuck no,” he said. His words were like a guillotine for her dreams. “I’d rather get it in the ass by megafauna than join a band of idiots like the Gordo clan.”

  Mac frowned, but she knew he could see the light. All she had to do was get him back to Jackmaw and the Gordo clan. They could spend their days getting high and pillaging settlements together. The dream now was to keep her friend and her clan, and she might get her wish yet. Off to the south, she recognized the mighty wings of the mega vulture.

  “Holy shit!” she cried. Hiking her satchel up her shoulder, she started to run in that direction. “Come on!”

  “Wait!” Krav called to her. He had never seen the mega vulture before, but he didn’t like the look of it. It lazily glided through the air, flapping powerful wings and searching for something. Even at this distance, Krav felt that the beast had an unholy intelligence to it.

  Shi-Toh trudged along in the sand. He was flanked by his three men armed with the automatic weapons. Behind, the red eyed woman commanded a small horde of lobotomite warriors. Behind them finally was the rifleman, who had his eyes locked on the back of the red eyed woman’s head.

  The feathered man was almost ready to give up. He had passed by Mallum Vid and the Pit almost a day ago, and his vague journey east was becoming tedious. Had it not been for the great Macaw, he would have let the war sage’s prediction remain as a spiritual rumor. Better Jackmaw’s infatuation die with Krav than to indulge the warlord’s dreams of having an apprentice.

  “Apprentice,” Shi-Toh scoffed to himself. “What a load of shit.”

  “What?” asked one of his retinue. The man who addressed him was Callum Hood, an inductee from a year ago. He would have made a good prospect for apprentice if Jackmaw really wanted one. Covered in fleas and needle marks, proficient with most of the clan’s arsenal, and loyal to a fault.

  Shi-Toh wrinkled his nose and waved him away. The less he had to interact with the mongrels of the clan the better. They were abominations, all of them. Had it been up to him, he would have been in the Emerald Expanse a day ago and he would be a wealthy warlord by the morning.

  About a mile away in the sky, the bird was behaving strangely. It circled the air in a spot as if it were leading them to war. It had picked up on a hostile threat, perhaps? Or it had found the remains of something tasty more likely. Shi-Toh turned to the woman from Kiva Noon.

  “Mobilize your machines. There may be trouble,” then to his men, he whistled and shouted, “The great vulture has detected something to the north, prepare for battle!”

  There was a quick frenzy as the group tightened. The lobotomites fell into a phalanx, locking into a triangle formation and leading from the front. The blinkers were mixed among them, prepared to make a surprise ranged attack from within the formation. Shi-Toh, the red eyed woman, and the pipe all remained in the back.

  They marched on like that towards the vulture. When it didn’t initially descend from the sky, Shi-Toh thought for sure it was a warring clan. He was just about to call a retreat when the creature swooped low with its claws extended and beak open. Eyebrows rose above the onyx glasses. Shi-Toh had never seen it do that before.

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  “Knock it off!” Mac cried. She was wrenching Krav’s arm and trying to stop him from throwing another rock. “That’s the holy mega vulture!”

  “I don’t care if its god himself! It gives me the creeps!” Krav broke free from her grip and launched another stone. It hit the bird on one wing and then he had the beast’s attention. It turned in the air, then was diving at them. The extended talons were like pointed knives and the beak was big enough to snap his arm off in one bite. Krav smiled. “That’s more like it.”

  Claws and beak hungered for blood, and the thing was quick. Krav felt like a mouse preparing to take on a diving hawk with a toothpick. As the talons approached, it was Mac that made the move to save them. Krav had the axe raised and a battle cry on his lips. The girl wrapped her arms around his waist and tackled him to the ground just in time for the creature to claw clumps of sand from the ground.

  The mega vulture flapped its massive wings and kicked up the desert dust around it. Hissing noises emitted from its beak as it turned to face Krav and Mac. The girl immediately dropped to her knees and bowed before it like she was begging for mercy from a god. It greeted her with a throaty cooing sound.

  The beast acted as if it enjoyed the veneration. It spread its wings wide, and at that size it could block out the sun itself. It stood at almost double the height of the girl and its mottled feathers blew like sails in the calm wind. There was no doubt that a creature like this could be worshipped by civilizations over. It was a deity of death and rebirth, of feasting amongst famines… and there was a boy with an axe who refused to bow to it.

  Krav let out another war cry and charged the mega vulture. Blood red eyes stared out of its pink head, and when it opened its beak, the boy saw that it had been modified. He had hunted for birds before, they didn’t have beaks like that. Someone had gotten close enough to this thing to file the bony protrusion into a serrated jaw. It caught him off guard, and when it snapped at him, he rolled rather than attacked.

  A flurry of pecks and stomping talons dotted the sand around Krav. When one foot came too close to his face, he slashed it with the axe and it flapped away with a pained squawk.

  It backed up and tucked the injured leg into its body. With all of its attention on Krav, it tried to intimidate him, and it almost worked. One legged, it spread its massive wings and shook them like it was vibrating. Feathers and sand floated to the floor, and for a moment, it really did look like a god. The mega vulture turned its head to the sky and let out a cry that sounded like the voice of a deity. Had Krav been just a bit smarter, he might have backed down.

  Another stone hit it in the chest mid cry, and it looked down with genuine surprise uncharacteristic of an animal. The boy was charging it again. With its head winding back, it whipped down at Krav with an open jaw. Krav had luck on his side, and he took the chance. He sidestepped the bird and slammed the axe into its head.

  Another pained squawk, and this time it didn’t try to intimidate. Krav’s axe had carved out one of its eyes, and it no longer wanted to fight. The boy was charging again, and this time, the creature flapped at an angle that pushed them away from each other. It ascended and Krav fell to the sands. Then it was retreating back to the sky.

  “Get back here! I’m going to cook you for lunch you, giant bitch!” He was scrambling out of the sand and looking for his weapon. At this range, he might still be able to peg it.

  The mega vulture returned to its master, who was approaching quickly over the dunes. It landed near them and looked back at Krav like a little kid who had just got his dad to fight his battles. The raiders it cowered with didn’t look like much, but from this far away, Krav could see the intoxicated gait of the man leading them.

  Mac dragged herself up off the floor when she heard the fighting cease. “You idiot! Do you know what kind of Karma you just lost attacking a mega vulture? I wouldn’t be surprised if you got reincarnated as a flea!”

  “It’ll be a long time before I reincarnate into anything. I’ll make it up later,” Krav said. His eyes were locked intently on the approaching group. He didn’t see Jackmaw’s ugly head above the rest of them.

  What he did see put him at ease, even if he thought he recognized the strange walk. An army of lobotomites was marching towards them. The last time he was in a fight that involved the damned of Kiva Noon, they were on his side. Because of Greenblatt, he had no more fear left in his heart for the mangled, shambling corpses. He tucked the axe into his belt and approached them.

  “Greenblatt?” he called to them. “Did you go back to Kiva Noon to get an army?”

  Krav was smiling as he approached, but then his smile quickly faltered. There was a powerful crack and then pain flared in his stomach. He fell to one knee and grasped his oozing wound. “Greenblatt?”

  “Krav!” Mac screamed. Years with the Gordo clan had exposed her to many gunshot wounds. Quickly, she pressed her hands over his wound and forced all of her weight onto it.

  The boy was watching the approaching group. His lips moved, but nothing came out.

  Shi-Toh emerged from the crowd, his pistol barrel smoking hot. He snorted and replaced the weapon at his hip. There was a coy smile on his face as he towered over them. “Come along, Miss Macaw. The clan has been missing your talents as of late.”

  A hand tangled her hair as she applied more and more pressure. Shi-Toh would have been a marvel to behold just moments ago, but now her friend was hurt. “Lord Shi-Toh! Please get the coagulant powder from my bag! This boy claims to be Lord Jackmaw’s apprentice, he can’t die!”

  “But he will. The warlord’s wishes are made in vanity. He does not need the boy. He needs you.”

  The hand in Mac’s hair twisted and snatched it like the reigns of a horse, then she was being lifted to her feet. She fought as long as she could to hold her hands over the wound, but more blood spilled out as she was torn away from him. “No! Wait!”

  “Leave him! This boy injured the holy mega vulture, and you still throw yourself in front of him? One more word out of your mouth and I’ll have you burned alive for insubordination!”

  The feathered man yanked her away, and she broke free, leaving him with a fistful of hairs. There wouldn’t be enough time before he was snatching her away again, so she grabbed the first thing she could from her pockets and plugged the wound. Then, Shi-Toh had her by the waist and was whipping her backwards.

  Mac’s clansmen were all hooting at her and Shi-Toh like he was about to drag her off behind a hill and have his way with her. One of them aimed his blinker to the sky and let off a spitfire of bullets while giving them a wolf whistle.

  “Come on! You’re integral to the next leg of our journey. I won’t let you jeopardize all of our progress!”

  Mac watched Krav as she was dragged away. Two lobotomite guards that stank of rust and decay snatched her arms and dragged her heels through the sand. The boy was still on the floor sucking shallow breaths. Then his chest stopped moving at all.

  Wordlessly, so as not to make good on Shi-Toh’s threats, she wept for her friend.

  It didn’t feel like it, but it wasn’t the first time Krav was on the brink of death. Something about the edge of oblivion floods the body with its own self-made intoxicants, and Krav was waiting at the veil.

  “Rufus?” he said weakly. Above him, his master’s body stood without its head. It bent low and stroked his hair. The dry, split knuckles Rufus had been so careless about in life felt like the gentle caress of a warm flame. The boy felt himself melting into it, closing his eyes in surrender.

  From his belt, Krav could hear the voice of his master. “Is this where it ends? Are you going to be a wandering soul like me so soon?”

  His master’s knobbed hands were snatching at the jumpsuit’s collar. They lifted him with a strength that the old man had never possessed in life. Krav felt like he was being ripped out of the most comfortable bed he had ever had the pleasure of sleeping in.

  “Five more minutes, Rufus,” he said. His voice sounded like he was choking on sand, and he coughed up something.

  “Now!” Rufus’s twisted hands wrenched deeper into Krav’s clothes.

  He was pulled further and further up, the wound in his gut aching like he had a spear stuck in it. Pained wails echoed into the valley as he finally sat all the way up. Krav was sobbing by the time it was all over, but he still had to stand.

  A shaking hand felt the bloody page stuffed in his wound. When he removed it, he felt every fiber rip at his ragged skin. It was the map that had gotten them in this situation in the first place, the one with the Emerald Expanse. The burning pain was unlike anything he had ever out himself through. He could still feel something in there, though. It was like a small stone had lodged itself just under the skin.

  With a poke, he could feel it move. It made him nauseous.

  “You have to pull it out,” Rufus said. Krav didn’t know how Rufus could talk to him without any drugs in his system, but he really wished he would shut up right about now.

  “That’s a shit idea,” Krav smiled. He took more shallow breaths to keep the pain from erupting out of his throat in anguished screams.

  “You have to.”

  Rufus was right. Rufus was always right. Krav’s breath picked up as he touched the axe to the stone in his stomach. A quick swipe would cut it right out of him. He rolled up his robe, bit down on it, and drew the sharp metal over his gut.