This Is Not the End

Chapter 1: Past and Present

"He did promise to stay clear of them," Xyli defended her brother, "But then the electricity nearly went out in the colony, and he broke into the Scorp's electrical control places and tried to hook up our colony's lines. Are you coming or what?"

"Fine!"

I slung my backpack from over my shoulder and pulled my black gas mask out of the front pocket. I held it right under my chin as I fastened the straps around the back of my head. I took a deep breath before pulling the mask over my face.

Once upon a time, I had been afraid of the tight mask, and claustrophobic when I put it on. But after years of being forced to wear the rubber headgear, I hardly cared.

"You're wearing yours, right? The Scorp's territory is Code Yellow," I asked my friend, my voice muffled and lower than usual as it projected through the filter.

Xyli looked at her gas mask. I knew that she was still a little nervous about them, ever since one of her friends, Velvet, had suffocated. Velvet's filter had gotten clogged and her straps stuck so she couldn't breathe or take the mask off. Xyli was terrified that it would happen to her and changed her filter two or three times a day, while I changed mine once a day.

"Since when?" Xyli asked, referring to my comment about the Scorpion's section of town being Code Yellow.

"They upgraded it after sunrise. The Consortium Air Force dropped a few shells of phosgene over their streets this morning."

Xyli shuddered.

"That's the fourth time shells have been in the city. You'd have thought we'd be safer..."

I knew what she was referring to. Xyli was one who still believed that the government was helping protect us. Just last week they'd issued another order to protect the big cities from shells. They made decrees like that to keep up morale and discourage rebellion. Nothing ever came from them. I didn't want to tell that to Xyli, though. Hope and faith were scarce lately. I wouldn't be the one to kill hers.

"The big cities are never safe," I told her, and changed the subject, "Put your mask on. Let's go."

I didn't wait for her; we both knew the way, and it was safer to travel alone.

My black boots clicked on the cracked pavement streets, and I had to dodge around ruined buildings and gaping potholes. Rats stood boldly on the path before me, used to the presence of humans, but scurried away as some mangy, hungry dogs tore after them hoping for a meal. I stopped for a moment to peer into a hole that seemed to go down forever: the remnants of a sewage line exposed by some explosion. Litter poured from abandoned parking lots and into the streets. Shells of cars lined the roads. Behind them, the collapsed pieces of what had once been shining New York City lay forgotten, filled with animals and bugs that had made it their home.

Here and there I jumped bits of debris, tugging at my mask to make sure it was secularly in place.

War had destroyed most of the world. The governments kept making promises for a better future, for repairs, for something. Nothing changed.

Most big cities were reduced to rubble by the war that had stretched for an eternity. Military supplies were used up in the first few years as both sides destroyed resources. Now the two societies fought with what few weapons they had left. Man-to-man fights with armies and guns were mostly in Africa and Australia, as both sides tried to win precious oil, gold, precious metal, and uranium supplies that the two continents held. Generals and politicians waited to see who got there first, for it was that side that could make new weapons and possibly win the war. The government leaders tried to rally the people and armies to help capture these supplies, but most civilians just didn't care anymore. They wanted the war to be over, or at least find a safe place for their families. No one even remembered what the war had been about. But everyone remembered their dead loved ones.