Snippetfic (TSCC) for Crypto: Emigrant Pass
cryptoxin asked for an SCC snippet a while back, and I started working on it, and then stopped because for a variety of reasons, creative writing just isn't happening right now.
However I pulled up the file and added the last couple of paragraphs to this, and, well. This is what happened.
Spoilers for "Born to Run", and everything else.
It's harder than you think, to survive in the time after the end of the world. Which is funny, really: you've spent all your life thinking about the end of the world, and the time afterwards. But when it comes to it, when you (foolishly, maybe) follow Weaver into that circle, you really truly don't understand what you're getting yourself into.
There's more food than you expected, but lots of it is spoiled. Canned goods don't last forever, and it's a question of luck whether this cold serving of refried beans is the one that kills you. Two weeks after you arrive, Rene dies of what you figure is botulism (but nobody knows for sure).
Even in the worst of times growing up, you pretty much always had clean clothes appropriate to the weather. Here, though you're still in LA, it's always grey, dim, and cold. Listening to the others, you pick up that they've even gotten snow a few times, although nobody's really sure what time of year it is anymore. Everyone's bundled in layers of faded and dingy mud-grey, usually stinking, often bloodstained. You're pretty sure even Allison hasn't washed her underwear in weeks. (Assuming she has any.) (You try not to think about her underwear.) (When you dream, you can't tell the difference between Allison and Cameron, and it makes it hard to talk to her when you're awake.)
Your uncle and your father--the two men who only know you as "that kid who showed up the night Kyle came back"--won't give you a gun because weapons are in short supply and they don't trust a kid with one of their most treasured resources. You don't get a chance to show what you can do until it's six months in and you've forgotten what it's like to not be filthy, hungry, and exhausted all the time. (Which makes you think about Riley and you hope to god you don't see her.)
You're moving camp from one shelter under the 5 to a warehouse three miles away, and Derek's put you at the rear of the line, collecting strays. (Kyle avoids you, thinks you're creepy because you still can't stop staring at me, man, it's freaky.)
Three of the younger kids are goofing around, and you don't harrass them for it--they never get much chance for fun in the shelters--but when the shooting starts, you hustle all three quick into cover, snapping at them just like that Salvadoran drill sergeant Mom used to talk about. When Bird takes one in the arm--Bird's a lean and snappish Asian guy about ten years your senior--you grab his weapon and lay down cover for the last of the cadre.
After that, Kyle still gives you the stinkeye, but Derek spends twenty minutes the next morning quizzing you on weapons care and use before issuing you one of the treasured Remingtons.
The Remington is heavy in your hands, the smell of the oil thick in your nostrils, as you set out on your first night patrol, padding quickly along behind your uncle. You're at the end of the line, and you know a lot, more than they realize, but you don't know if it's enough.
The last few years you've learned more than you wanted to about the man you have become, will become, might become, in the future. You don't like him very much. You don't want to be John Connor.
But if John Connor is what you need to be to survive this, then John Connor is what you're going to be.
Crossposted to both LJ and DW; comment on either site.
However I pulled up the file and added the last couple of paragraphs to this, and, well. This is what happened.
Spoilers for "Born to Run", and everything else.
It's harder than you think, to survive in the time after the end of the world. Which is funny, really: you've spent all your life thinking about the end of the world, and the time afterwards. But when it comes to it, when you (foolishly, maybe) follow Weaver into that circle, you really truly don't understand what you're getting yourself into.
There's more food than you expected, but lots of it is spoiled. Canned goods don't last forever, and it's a question of luck whether this cold serving of refried beans is the one that kills you. Two weeks after you arrive, Rene dies of what you figure is botulism (but nobody knows for sure).
Even in the worst of times growing up, you pretty much always had clean clothes appropriate to the weather. Here, though you're still in LA, it's always grey, dim, and cold. Listening to the others, you pick up that they've even gotten snow a few times, although nobody's really sure what time of year it is anymore. Everyone's bundled in layers of faded and dingy mud-grey, usually stinking, often bloodstained. You're pretty sure even Allison hasn't washed her underwear in weeks. (Assuming she has any.) (You try not to think about her underwear.) (When you dream, you can't tell the difference between Allison and Cameron, and it makes it hard to talk to her when you're awake.)
Your uncle and your father--the two men who only know you as "that kid who showed up the night Kyle came back"--won't give you a gun because weapons are in short supply and they don't trust a kid with one of their most treasured resources. You don't get a chance to show what you can do until it's six months in and you've forgotten what it's like to not be filthy, hungry, and exhausted all the time. (Which makes you think about Riley and you hope to god you don't see her.)
You're moving camp from one shelter under the 5 to a warehouse three miles away, and Derek's put you at the rear of the line, collecting strays. (Kyle avoids you, thinks you're creepy because you still can't stop staring at me, man, it's freaky.)
Three of the younger kids are goofing around, and you don't harrass them for it--they never get much chance for fun in the shelters--but when the shooting starts, you hustle all three quick into cover, snapping at them just like that Salvadoran drill sergeant Mom used to talk about. When Bird takes one in the arm--Bird's a lean and snappish Asian guy about ten years your senior--you grab his weapon and lay down cover for the last of the cadre.
After that, Kyle still gives you the stinkeye, but Derek spends twenty minutes the next morning quizzing you on weapons care and use before issuing you one of the treasured Remingtons.
The Remington is heavy in your hands, the smell of the oil thick in your nostrils, as you set out on your first night patrol, padding quickly along behind your uncle. You're at the end of the line, and you know a lot, more than they realize, but you don't know if it's enough.
The last few years you've learned more than you wanted to about the man you have become, will become, might become, in the future. You don't like him very much. You don't want to be John Connor.
But if John Connor is what you need to be to survive this, then John Connor is what you're going to be.
Crossposted to both LJ and DW; comment on either site.