This is a short story I wrote for a couple of contests, neither of which I ended up actually submitting to, which is what a blog is for. One of the contests was for a dystopian short story, while the other encouraged applying biblical themes. Thus, here is a short story about a cannibalistic dystopian society in which self-sacrifice plays an important role.
I don't know when people decided to start eating each other. Some of the eldest of our camp speak of famine, others of war. But not everyone is starving now, and some could afford peace. At least, that's what I've been told. All I know is that those who don't have the luxury or conscience to partake in this practice still go hungry and still fight for their lives.
An undeniable chill clung to my skin, not only from the freezers but from the lurid feel of this place, until I ached from resisting the urge to shiver. I wondered if this struggle in my body could be heard, or the pattering of my socks against the concrete floor, or the frantic drumming of my heart.
It grew colder as I walked through the slaughterhouse and approached the first of many platforms. Rows upon rows of naked, gutted human bodies hung by their ankles from the ceiling. I had no impulse to vomit as I thought I would--there was no smell of flesh in the sterile air. Could a passerby, then, detect the stench of my shoes, tucked under my arm in order to quiet my footsteps? I wasn't waiting around to find out. I needed to get to the holding cells. I needed to find my brother.
I had no idea where I was going, but let my impulses guide me. Left at this hallway, second door on the right. My mother had told me that I had good instincts, that I would be a good big brother because of them, that they would help me take care of Kendall. That was before she died, her own body starved in order to feed the two of us. Things have gotten better since then, maybe because I've relied on my instincts to keep my brother and myself alive. But we weren't always lucky, and sometimes I wondered if my mother had only told me about my "instincts" in order to motivate me to work harder, which I did once she left us. Now, for Kendall's sake, I hoped that she was right after all.
I knew that most of the meat that the Hunters harvested would be shipped out of the ruins of our city to where those of wealth were fabled to live, which meant I only had so much time before he was butchered and sent away. I had already waited until nightfall to break into the slaughterhouse--I knew I might already be too late.
I swallowed back my guilt as I crept past racks upon racks of gutted humans, heading for whatever lay on the other side of the slaughtering floor. I shouldn't have blown up at him the night before for scaring me. He hadn't returned from scavenging at sundown. I thought for sure the Hunters had snatched him, until he finally loped into our shelter with that stupid grin on his face, telling me that he'd wandered beyond our territory and found the ruins of an ancient airplane. I gave him a black eye, wiped his grin right off. He hadn't spoken a word to me the rest of the night, and stalked off the next morning without eating.
I found a freezer-sealed door that made my muscles burn as I hauled it open, revealing a narrow, empty corridor that served as a buffer between where the people were slaughtered and where I could only hope the people were kept. I hurried to the end of the hall and opened the next door.
A blast of humid, dank air hit me. The lights were much dimmer here, as if to match the heaviness I felt on entering that place. I did want to vomit once my eyes adjusted tot he row upon rows of cells--no, cages--that extended all the way to the back of the building.
At the first sound of a human voice, my legs began to move. My instinct to run preceded the sudden howling of those around me, begging for help, for mercy. There was no way this uproar would go unnoticed. The time to find my brother had been drastically reduced.
I scanned each passing eye as I sprinted through the cellblocks. Some were clouded from sedation, others were dilated, white with terror. In the back of my head, I noticed that many of the cages were empty and thought, Room for expansion...
I found his eyes just an instant before he screamed my name, "Harlan!" My brother's bony fingers were white as he clutched the bars, standing there in his same crumpled clothes, his eye now dark and swollen. Tears ran down his cheeks.
My socks caused me to slide as I stopped and fumbled for he lock pick in my pocket. It had been my only strategy for rescuing my brother, and it had gotten me this far. My hands trembled as I jiggled it into the key hole, and for a moment I thought the lock might be too sophisticated to be picked. Then, I heard the click.
Kendall stumbled out of his cage, and I had to catch him to keep him from falling, he was shaking so badly. He clung to me and I held onto him, as if squeezing him tighter would make him safer. It was the first time we'd embraced since we were children.
"They didn't hurt you?" I asked, still unwilling to let him go.
He shook his head against my shoulder, "They said-they said they had to wait for my black eye to heal, that no one would mount a damaged head."
So, I had saved him once from the monsters with enough extravagance as to use the heads of fellow men as decoration. Could I do it again? "Let's go," I told him. I slipped my shoes on for a quick getaway, then took my brother by the hand.
Though still shaken and stiff from his confinement, Kendall began to fall in step with me, and we made good progress getting out of the cellblock, out of the screaming and sobbing and wanton hope that I knew I had caused.
We made it out to the slaughtering floor before the night guards rushed in, six or seven of them, guns at the ready, shouting at us to halt. They hesitated to fire, and for a moment I had no idea why. Then, my instincts gripped me, and I pushed my brother onto one of the platforms of hanging, gutted bodies. Kendall cried out as their cold, stiff fingers caressed his skin.
I managed to catch him by the shirt as I dove in after him and pulled him towards the back wall. The night guards shouted at us to come out, the barrels of their gun searching for us in the human forest. But, they wouldn't fire. As popular as the consumption of human flesh was, it was an expensive, difficult venture, and whoever ran this place couldn't afford to have their product riddled with bullets.
For just a few minutes, we and the guards were at a stalemate--they blocked our exit, and we threatened their business. The men hesitated, muttering amongst themselves. Then, several of them headed in after us, with the rest still guarding against any escape.
Kendall and I weaved away from them, now trapped in a gruesome maze of hanging bodies. We began losing ground--the ones coming in after us were driving us towards those who guarded the entrance. Before long, we would run out of cover. The idea hit me, and I knew it would either be our salvation or my final act. I reached up and pulled one body from its hook. It hit the ground with a stiff thud. I unhooked another and another.
The guards dove for them, desperate to save their product. At the first opening I saw, I grabbed my brother, slung a small, hollow body around our shoulders, and bolted for the door.
My trick didn't last long--I could hear their boots thundering behind us. We rounded a corner, and I could see the door to the outside still ajar from when I had sneaked in. We were going to make it; as soon as we were out of the building, we could duck into the city ruins and disappear. We were just a few hundred feet from our freedom.
Then, the guards began to fire. Bullets riddled the meat shield on our backs, almost knocking us onto our faces.
"Harlan!" my brother cried out. I could feel his nails digging into my hand. I glanced back at him, saw his wide, terrified eyes, saw the guards just behind him, saw the bullets ricocheting off the walls. I looked back at the door that didn't seem any closer than it had moments ago. We weren't going to make it, not like this. There would be no salvation for the two of us
But maybe for my brother.
With what I knew would be my last act of instinct, I hurled Kendall towards the door and shouted at him, "Go!" I didn't have time to wait and make sure he listened. I spun on my heel, and my vision shrank to a small circle surrounded by black clouds, centered on the face of the closest guard. I ran at him.
Sure, my brother was an idiot. He was lazy and irresponsible, and he could barely take care of himself. But he was my brother, and I loved him, and if one of us had to die today, it wasn't going to be the one whose "stupid grin" could illuminate my dark, dismal world. I ran at the guards, using myself as his new shield. And as the clouds consumed the rest of my vision, I imagined that each bullet that entered my body was another year he could keep smiling.
