In a future where science has gone horribly wrong, the greatest adventure of all may be a boy’s rites of passage on the path to becoming a man.
My Walking was tomorrow and I was scared, only knowing half of what to expect. The other half was what was causing my high anxiety–the unknown in the form of rumors and speculation. Everyone kept reminding me how dangerous it was. I guess being scared showed because Gran’father seemed concerned. Usually he ignored what I was doing or thinking, but now he seemed worried.
We stood in front of the heavy, gray metal door and looked through the thick glass at the missile in the space called a silo. Instruments with dials and knobs lined one wall of the room we were in. Gran’father checked the instruments and wrote a note on a clipboard. He clicked his tongue and shook his head. “I wonder if we’ll ever have to launch it,” he said, fingering the key that hung from his neck on a chain.
I knew the key was required to launch the missile–Gran’father had showed me how to use it. “Just in case,” he said.
The song the little kids sang as they played war–throwing make-believe bombs at each other then running and hiding–came into my head. We all played it when we were little.
Missile, missile, in the room,
Watch it go boom, boom, boom.
“Tell me again why we would have to launch it, Gran’father.”
“It’s called retaliation. We’re still at war and this is our reserve bomb. I’m sure there are others around the country in places just like this one.” He shook his head. “After all these years, we’ve never learned. What a waste.”
“What do you mean, ‘We’ve never learned?’ Never learned what?” I asked, but Gran’father began to get lost in his memories again. I hated when that happened, so I interrupted him. “Tell me about the Walking, Gran’father, one more time before I leave on mine.”
“Ah, the Walking. You’re ready for your Walking. You think you’re ready to be a grownup, huh?” He looked at me sideways through his narrowed eyes.
I nodded, but he had turned back to the gray door and said, “Someday this key will be your responsibility. I just hope you’re mature enough and understand enough to handle the responsibility.” He glanced at me again and shook his head as if doubting his own words.
Every time we came by this room, I thought of the boom tune. I couldn’t get it out of my head.
We turned from the gray door and walked into the common room of the bunker. “I used to think this day would never arrive,” I said, “and here it is.” I was excited.
“Calm down, boy. Don’t get overconfident. When will you be eighteen?”
“In two days. I’m eager to get going.” Actually I was very scared, but I wouldn’t admit it.
“I can see that. I keep thinking we should wait until you’re older–maybe twenty-one, or maybe two of you should go together.”
I frowned and watched him as he seemed to get lost again in his memories, but he looked up and said, “Did you choose the Zone or the Mountain?”
“The Zone.” I had told him this many times, but he always forgets.
“And you leave tomorrow?”
“Yes, in the morning.”
Gran’father looked pensive, probably recalling his memories again. He did that often, going in and out of his memories. All the old-timers seemed to do that. Sometimes they talk to themselves. Now, he mumbled something like, “He’s not ready for the key. Will he ever be?” and shook his head. “So, you want to hear again what to look for on your Walking, what to prepare for?”
I nodded, waiting impatiently. Gran’father was one of the few “old ones” left. He has trouble seeing and keeps saying he wishes he hadn’t misplaced his glasses. He’s really getting forgetful. I brought him several pieces of glass just last week but he obviously forgot about them. He has a big, fluffy white beard like a cloud and it has little bits of dirt stuck in it. The top of his head is slick like a rock, except for the wild hair around his ears. His face is very wrinkled and he walks bent over with a cane.
“I’ll tell you again, boy, the first thing is don’t be so cocky. It’ll be your downfall. You’re supposed to kill a beetle, not be killed by one. It’s very dangerous out there. Very dangerous. You’ve got the hot sun, the beetles, and the cold to contend with. Sometimes a Walker doesn’t come back.”
Soon as he said that, another tune popped into my head.
Beetle, beetle is outside,
Waiting, waiting to cut your hide.
Hurry, hurry, run away,
Come on back another day.
“I know, I know.” Several of my friends hadn’t come back from their Walking and we never knew what happened, although everyone thinks the beetles got them. I really didn’t want to go, but it was required to be accepted as an adult. “It’s your right of passage,” the old ones said.
Like us, the girls had their own right of passage they had to go through, but theirs wasn’t anything dangerous like a trip to the Zone or the Mountain. Something to do with babies and things like that.
Gran’father looked at me and frowned. “Now listen up, boy. When you walk into the Zone, pay attention to the size of the rubble heaps. The very big heaps like hills indicate that’s where an apartment house was.”
“Tell me again about a part ment houses, Gran’father.”
“I keep forgetting you’ve never seen them before. An apartment house is where large groups of people used to live.”
“Like we have now.”
He shook his head. “No, grandson. Before the blast we used to have tall buildings with many people living side-by-side and on top of one another. Now people here only live side-by-side. No one is on top of anyone and we don’t have so many people any more. Where we live now is called a ‘bunker’.”
I visualized many people standing on top of each other and smiled at his senile ways. Gran’father often doesn’t make sense. Why would you want people to stand on top of each other? Side-by-side I could see, since that’s what we do now. Everyone has their own place with their family, but no one has anyone on top of them. Suppose the person on top of you wanted to go to the pit but you didn’t? And what happened if one of them fell? And how many people can you hold up?
“What about the things inside these tall a part ment buildings, Gran’father?”
“Well, each person’s house was furnished differently. They could do whatever they wanted in their home. Furnish it however they wanted, come and go like they wanted. We called them apartments.”
Even though I’d heard this before, I wrinkled my brow and smiled at his strange words. “What’s a ment?” I asked.
“A ment?”
“You said ‘everyone lived in a part ments.’”
Gran’father shook his head. “You’ve got a sense of humor, boy.” But he didn’t smile. I’ve never seen him smile.
There were so many times I didn’t understand him, especially when he drifted into his memories. Now, he looked pensive again. He keeps going in and out of his memories. “What’re you seeing, Gran’father?” I asked.
“Just thinking of the past, boy, way before your time. Before the blasts. Before the wars. Before all this damned rubble. When everyone had a father and a mother, good food, and new clothing.”
I didn’t want him to get lost in one of his memory lapses because he could go on and on, so I quickly asked, “What should I look for during my Walking, Gran’father?”
He looked at me for a second then said, “Look for white boxes with doors. We used to store food in them.” He used his hands to show how big they were. “They used to keep food cold for us.”
A box with a door that kept food cold? I smiled. “What else?”
“We had devices to heat our food. We called them toasters and microwaves and ovens.”
“Why did you have so many things to heat food but only one to keep it cold?”
“We used these things to heat different foods. Some things we cooked quickly, others took a long time to cook.”
I shook my head. “You made different fires for different foods? Isn’t that wasteful?”
He sighed. “I keep forgetting you never saw any of these things. And now your food is…”
“Anything else, Gran’father?” I said, quickly, before he lapsed again into his memories.
“Bathrooms. We had bathrooms.”
“I know. That’s a place to take a bath. Like we do now.”
“More than that,” he said, shaking his shaggy head. “It was a room where you’d bathe or wash or use the toilet. The toilet was a place where you sat on a large white pot to poop.”
That made me laugh. “Suppose you didn’t have your white pot with you when you had to poop?”
“A toilet is like the pit you use now,” he said. “It was always there.”
“You also washed or bathed in the pit, I mean, the pot?” I asked, my eyes wide.
“No, no, boy. The pit…er…the pot was nearby. We washed and bathed in separate…uh, containers.”
I always had trouble imagining what he was talking about and tried to visualize a pit with everyone peeing in it and some people carrying a small container to wash in. I shook my head at my doddering Gran’father. Sometimes he got lost in his memories and other times it seemed like he was losing them.
“You know that small piece of glass I gave you? The one that looks back at you? The mirror?”
“Yes.” It was in my pack. I undid the strap, took it out, and looked at it. It easily fit in the palm of my hand. My eye stared back at me. If I held it farther from my face, I could almost see my whole face.
“Well, we used to have bigger ones,” he said. He spread his arms out and up. “Very big ones. You could see your whole body in them. People would decorate their houses with them. It could make a small room look bigger.”
I looked at the glass fragment, the mirror, I held in my hand. All I could see was my eye. I frowned and squinted at it, trying to make my eye bigger. I didn’t know what he was talking about. “You’ll have to show me how to make my eye bigger, Gran’father.”
“Make your eye bigger?”
He’s really losing it. He just said it could make a room bigger so why couldn’t it make my eye bigger? “I’ve got to go and get ready, Gran’father. I’ll see you in the morning before I go.”
“One more thing, son.”
“What’s that, Gran’father?” I was getting anxious.
“Be very careful in the larger piles of rubble. That’s where the beetles are.”
I knew about the beetles. They were big like a cat, Gran’father said, only I’ve never seen a real live cat. I’ve seen pictures of them, but they seemed so small.
“The beetles move slowly but are very strong. They can only be stopped with brute force. They’ll slice and cut you if they get close enough,” he said.
I nodded. I’ve heard many stories about the beetles. They’re the only animals that survived the blasts. They eat anything and are very dangerous. Once they see you they won’t stop coming after you. They’ll cut you to shreds and eat you. That’s what probably happened to my friends who didn’t return from their Walking.
“Remember, boy, if you see them, get away fast. Don’t get cocky around them. They have big mouths and large pincers and slicers. It won’t take much for one to cut you into little pieces and devour you in seconds. And they can fly at you. You got to be real careful or they’ll kill you.”
He raised his voice and his eyes locked on mine and seemed to burn into me. The beetle stories scared me, but I wanted to see one and kill it. That was the purpose of the Walking, to get a beetle and to show you could handle yourself out “there.” To prove you were an adult. Most Walkers were afraid of them and many only brought back something they found in the Zone and then the old timers had to explain what they were. Only a few Walkers ever brought back a beetle or part of a beetle. And some of them never came back.
Beetle, beetle, is outside. Hurry away, you can’t hide.
“Don’t stay out too long. You shouldn’t stay more than twelve hours. I mean twelve times. You need to be back when the sun goes down. It’ll get very cold.”
“I know, Gran’father. I know.”
“But you have no way to tell the time.”
There he goes again with that “time” thing. Like putting the sun on my wrist, he said. I shook my head. The old timers told great stories, but they were all crazy. Why would you ever want to put the sun on your wrist? And how could you do that? All I could think about was how hot it would get and burn your wrist. It didn’t make sense. “I’ll be back before it gets cold and see you soon, Gran’father.” I stood to leave. “I’ll bring you a piece of a beetle.”
“Come hug your grandfather.”
He pulled me tight to him. I could feel him run his hand over my back scales and heard him mumble something about green skin. Then I heard him sigh. I wonder why he did that?
“Remember, boy, mark your way and it’s okay if you don’t get a beetle. If you don’t, bring me back something from the Zone. You can find some good things in the big piles of rubble.”
“The a-part-ment things,” I said.
He nodded.
“I will, Gran’father.”
“Be careful of the beetles. If you’re too cocky they’ll get you.”
I pulled away and watched him holding the key hanging from his neck. He always wore it. He looked at me and shook his head slightly. I turned and walked back to my sleeping place. The Walking would be my first initiation in entering the world of the men. All us kids went through it when we reached eighteen seasons.
“The underground bunker was where everyone stayed when war came,” Gran’father had told me many seasons ago. “When the first war started, the Army selected who would live underground. Years later, when we came to the surface, the war started again, so we went back down. The wars happened several times, and each war was worse than the one before it. No one thought we’d have to stay underground so long and because of that we ran out of supplies and had to make our own food.”
The old ones say it’s yucky artificial food, but I think it’s okay. Gran’father said the old food used to smell and get everyone’s appetite going, but why would you want your food to smell? When I asked him, he only shook his head and got lost in his memories. He does that often.
Gran’father said we sleep on the ground because the beds rusted away years ago and the mattresses rotted and had to be burned. I remember what a mattress was, but they were big and heavy and would be difficult to carry, so why bother? Gran’father also said most of our clothes are in shreds and we’ll soon be without them, too, because we never learned to make new ones. I don’t know why we can’t make new ones but unless it gets very cold, we really don’t need them. Whenever I tell that to Gran’father, he shakes his head like he’s exasperated and looks disgusted.
Now, the children here in the bunker are different from the old ones like Gran’father–we have tougher skin with back scales, more fingers, and rotating feet to accommodate the rubble. Gran’father says the children today are much heartier than in his day and the body changes will either save the human race or end it. Why would they end it? Sometimes I just don’t understand him. Then he’ll shake his head and mumble something about radioactivity and get lost in his memories again. He always does that…gets lost in his memories. All the old people do that. They like to sit by the fire and talk about the days before the war. I like to listen to them, but sometimes they get all crazy with their stories and don’t make any sense.
Sometimes they do say good things, though. Gran’father told me a trick he used to find his way back when he went on his Walking, only I don’t know that he really went on a Walking. I think he lived on the surface before the wars, and came down here after they started so he wouldn’t have had a Walking. But then I think that maybe he had a Walking while he lived on the surface. Why couldn’t they have had them then, too?
“You make a mark on the ground with rocks,” he said, “and when you need to come home, you simply follow the rocks.” Sometimes he says funny things like that. I tried to visualize a rock moving and Gran’father following the rock, and I laughed, but now I think I know what he meant–to follow the trail of the rocks, and I thought it might be a smart thing to do. I’d make several piles on the ground, a big pile behind me and a small pile in the direction I was heading toward the Zone, and the reverse would point the way to go home. That made sense. I smiled knowing that Gran’father probably did the same during his Walking. Maybe he wasn’t so crazy after all–at least about this.
“Tell me again how the Zone become the Zone, Gran’father.”
Before he spoke, Gran’father always shook his head. Now, he looked lost in thought and just when I thought he forgot my question, he spoke. “The Zone is where a blast happened long ago. There were many people in different countries before the blast and they began to argue. Soon the arguments got mean and the people began using weapons against each other.”
“Like the missile behind the door in the gray room?” I asked.
“Yes, that’s right.” He looked away, lost in his memories, again. “That’s also when people used to fly in the air,” he told me.
How can I believe such a crazy thing? “I know beetles have wings and can fly, Gran’father, but I don’t understand how people can.”
He smiled. “The people didn’t fly by themselves, boy. They’d sit in long metal tubes and the tubes would do the flying,” he said. “The tubes carried bombs and dropped them on the people they were fighting. That made the blasts and created the Zones all over the world. There were also rockets.” He paused. “Those are tubes that zoom through the air without people, like the one in the gray room.”
I noticed Gran’father fingered the key, again. He always did that when he talked about his memories.
“They’d smash into a target and explode,” he said.
I’d laugh at these silly stories of flying tubes that had people in them.
“That’s how your father and mother were killed,” he said, and shook his head. “They blasted the other people, but the others blasted them too. You were only a little baby when they died.” He looked up at the ceiling like there was something there, but I couldn’t see anything special. Then he put his arms in front of him like he was carrying something. “This is how I held you in my arms when you were a baby and I took you down here into the bunker.”
I smiled at that. We don’t have many babies here, but I had seen some little ones. Some of them died, but a few grew up like me. It’s mostly the girls who do the baby caring, not the boys. The girls stay in a separate part of the bunker and don’t get to go outside much. Something about protecting their inside parts. I don’t really know what that means but Gran’father said I’ll find out after I get back from my Walking. Then, after the Walking ceremony, I have to stay with one of them for a while.
“There were many blasts,” said Gran’father. “They were radioactive.”
“What’s radioactive?”
“If you went near it you could get sick and die. The radioactivity made you sick. Sometimes it would even change the way people looked.”
“What does radioactivity look like?”
“You can’t see it,” he said. “You just can’t stay near it for long.”
“How did you know it was there if you can’t see it?”
“It’s like poisoned air. You know that some water holes have bad water? Well, some air is also bad and it’ll kill you if you stay near it too long. Everyone had instruments to measure if we were near it.” He held out his hand like he was holding something in it, moved it slowly from side to side, and clicked his tongue.
I shook my head. I can see bad water, but I can’t see radioactive air. I didn’t say anything.
“That’s why we don’t see any birds or other animals,” he said. “The radioactivity killed them. Thank heaven there’s not much of it anymore, especially in the Zone.”
I’d heard stories and seen pictures of birds flying in the sky.
“Birds are like beetles,” he explained. “They have wings and can fly, but the birds were friendly and there were a lot of them. The beetles are the only things that survived the blast besides us, and we survived only because we hid underground for many years. Some animals survived for a while because they were underground, but eventually they, too, died from radioactivity or starvation.”
“How would they get radioactivity if they lived underground?”
“They got their food from the surface, so they’d have to go up and try and find some.”
He shook his head slowly like he was thinking of his memories, and I looked at his beard, wondering if any bits of dirt would fall out.
“So in order to find food,” he continued, “they’d have to stay out longer and longer. Remember, the blasts killed everything, including the food they needed.”
Gran’father has so many great stories. Sometimes they’d make me laugh, but I learned not to laugh too much when he was telling them. He didn’t seem to like it when I didn’t believe his stories.
When the darkness came I laid down and slept. It wasn’t a good sleep because I was anxious and excited about my Walking in the morning. When I dozed, I had a dream where a beetle found me and I had to fight it and it cut me up into little pieces.
In the morning I woke early and swallowed my breakfast pill. I put one water container and one food bar in my pack. The food bar had three food pills in it–enough for one full day. That was all I was allowed to take.
Gran’father was sitting there and watched me when I woke up and took the pill. He wasn’t smiling…none of the old men did when one of us young ones went on a Walking.
I left at the first opening of the doors after hugging Gran’father and walked through the long tunnel into the open. The sun wasn’t very hot yet and I was comfortable. I walked down the hill for about two times until I came to the Zone’s outer limit. By now the bright sun blasted down, and the Zone landscape looked the same everywhere–white powder, like ash from a fire, covered everything. It was a scene of total devastation as far as I could see. White rocks littered the white earth. After I walked for another time in the Zone I came upon a large mass of rubble and decided to explore it. This was what Gran’father said to look for: an a-part-ment. I pulled rocks off a large pile, digging deep into it. I enjoyed the cool ground under the rocks and found a long piece of shiny metal about an arm’s length long. It was hollow with a flat end and a short groove along one edge. I stuck it in my pack. Maybe Gran’father could tell me what it was.
Pulling more rocks away, I found two small, shiny pieces of metal. Brushing the dirt away I stared at them, trying to understand what they were. One said “cold,” but it wasn’t cold; the other said “hot,” but it wasn’t hot. They were both only cool from being buried. I put them into my pack. Maybe Gran’father would know what these were. They were probably in his memories, somewhere.
I continued to pull rocks away when I saw movement to my left and glimpsed a black beetle slowly walking. It was huge, just like I had been told. It had a clumsy walk, more like a stumble, but I knew they were dangerous. I bent low hoping he didn’t see me.
I waited until he walked past me, then hurried further into the Zone to avoid him. I thought about how many times I had been there. The sun was high overhead and very hot, and I wondered if I would ever understand Gran’father. “You put the sun on your wrist to tell how long you were out,” he said. Jeez.
I walked on the rubble heap for about one more time and stopped at another large pile of rubble. The sun beat down on me but my back scales fanned me to keep me cool. Gran’father didn’t have scales, but I guess that was because he was so old and he lost his. I supposed I’d lose mine, too, when I got that old.
I stopped and swallowed some water. The water was in an unusual container. Gran’father said you press the top and it goes “foof.” That tells you that the water is fresh and the top is open so you could drink. I laughed at that. I did it now and it went “foof.” It was so funny, but I was glad the water was cool.
I continued rummaging through the rocks, looking for something new to take back in addition to what I already had. I found a larger piece of glass–a mirror–that showed my eyes and face and put it in my pack. Then I saw it off to the side: mostly buried in the dirt, one corner sticking out. It looked like the big white box that Gran’father had talked about.
I dug around it for a while so I could get it free. It was just like Gran’father had said; a box that keeps food cold. I got some more of the box free and dropped to my knees to dig all of it out. I worked at freeing it for at least one sun time. I was getting really warm. My scales could only do so much to keep me cool, but soon the box stood in front of me. A pull was on the front. I grasped it and it swung open just like a door. I wanted to see the food in it. There were two compartments: a big one on top and a smaller one below it, but I couldn’t see how either one kept food cold. Gran’father said that insulation kept the cold inside and you could even get ice from it, but I couldn’t find any place in it that kept cold inside and there wasn’t any ice. And there wasn’t any food in it.
I know about ice. My friend, who did his Walking to the Mountain, told me that ice was all over. “Ice was like a very cold rock that changes to water when it gets warm, but it happens slowly.” I couldn’t think why Gran’father would want to put rocks that change to water in a box like this. Since I was doing my Walking in the Zone, I had to wait two seasons before I could go on a Mountain Walking.
I had finished the digging when I heard a noise and turned. Two black beetles, their shiny, black armor-plated bodies trimmed with red, were walking toward me. I became scared and backed away. I didn’t want to fight two of them.
Their brightly grouped eyes followed me, and their long legs clicked on the hard rocks as they moved, their pincers opening and closing. I watched their mouths move like they were talking. It was bad enough having to fight one beetle, but now I had two of them. I picked up a rock and held it over my head to threaten them, but they continued coming.
I aimed carefully at the nearest one and threw. The rock glanced off him but all he did was unfluff his body plate and refold it. I picked up another rock, this time a larger one, and climbed higher on the rubble. Using two hands, I held the rock over my head and smashed it down onto one, hitting him directly on top. He collapsed, then slowly stood on his rear legs and smoothed himself out. One of his legs was broken and he left it behind. I noticed that he now leaned to his right and his top body armor plate dragged as he clicked along toward me, but he was moving a little slower.
“The beetles move slowly,” Gran’father had said, “because their armor is so heavy, but don’t be fooled, they are very strong and when they decide to fly they are even more dangerous than when they crawl.”
Another rock and another smash. The beetles were tough, I gave them that, but I didn’t want to be shredded by two stupid beetles. At least I hoped I wouldn’t be. They slowly scratched their way up the rubble pile I was on. As soon as one reached the top of a flat rock I smashed a large rock down hard on him. Green matter oozed from him. He was hurt but he still came, dragging several body plates. I leapt from pile to pile but they continued to come after me, the wounded one moving much slower, leaving a trail of green slime.
I’d hit the other beetle several times but now he flexed his wings, probably getting ready to fly when he thought I was unable to defend myself. They didn’t fly much because they are so heavy, and they didn’t stay in the air for very long, but once in the air they were very dangerous. I threw more rocks, hitting each of them but not stopping them. The mostly unhurt one again flexed his wings again, and with a buzz of noise, leapt at me. He came so close I could hear a swoosh as he flew by. I ducked, but I was really worried. Even though he was wounded, the beetle on the ground continued toward me. I ducked to avoid the flying beetle, knowing eventually he’d catch me and his slicers would cut deep.
I jumped down from the pile I was on, ran behind the slow-moving wounded beetle, picked up a large rock and smashed it hard on him before he could turn around. More green matter spluttered out and he struggled to free himself from under the rock. I dodged as the flying beetle spun by my head and came close enough to slice my cheek, just missing my eye. His slicer was so sharp I didn’t feel the cut for several seconds. I could hear him screech, enjoying the taste of my blood as he prepared to fly at me again.
Beetle, beetle, is outside. Hurry away, you can’t hide.
I took the metal rod out of my pack, thinking I’d use it as a club. When the beetle flew by I swung at him, but missed. He cut me again as he flew by, this time on my head. It hurt so much I fell to one knee. I was really worried. He circled for another attack. This time he flew straight at me, heading directly toward my face, his pincers and slicers sticking straight out ready for the kill.
I held the metal rod out in front of me, pointing it directly at the beetle’s open mouth. If I missed, I would be sliced again and much deeper. It screeched as it came close and flew onto the metal and impaled itself. The force almost knocked me down. I heard it screech as it flapped its armored wings trying to remove itself from the metal rod. I set the beetle down on its back. Its legs waved as it struggled to right itself. I quickly hefted a large rock and smashed it onto his lightly armored underside. Green matter squished from him. I let him die before I pulled my metal spear out. It took me a minute to rip off his armored shell and put it into my pack to show Gran’father. I did it with the other one, too. I was breathing heavy and still very scared, but although I won the fight, I didn’t feel so confident anymore. My blood dripped all over me.
My heart almost stopped when a third beetle appeared and stared at me, but decided to head to the dead beetles and devour them. I could hear him sloshing up the remains. I thought about fighting it but decided it was better to get away because the scent from my blood would only attract more beetles.
I hurried back to the white box and ran my fingers over it, letting the long fingers on top of my wrists feel it also. These fingers were very sensitive. Gran’father would want to know what it felt like. Smooth and cool, although now, where the sun hit it, it was warm.
I’d accomplished my Walking goal: to kill a beetle. I got two of them and had their armor as proof, so I thought I’d better head back. I was bloody and tired. I wiped the blood from my face before it ran into my eyes. I lost track of how many times had passed and also lost my direction. Gran’father said if I got lost to criss-cross the path I was on, not continue along it. That way it would be easier to find the right path I needed to find my way home. Gran’father had said to watch the sun. It would be behind me going to the Zone and behind me coming back. I turned to the right and walked for about a half time, then turned and walked in the other direction. My scales expanded and fanned to their limit to protect me from the heat of the sun. Even though the sun was setting, soon it would be dark and then the cold would come. My scales couldn’t protect me from the cold. Without protection from the cold, I could die.
I saw hills and headed for them only to be disappointed by their barrenness. Everything was coated with white dust: the rocks, the rubble, and the ground. My eyes hurt from so much white. Gran’father said it was because of the blasts. The blasts killed everything, burned everything. He used the word “desolate.” I began to understand what that meant.
I headed toward a large pile of rubble that might be able to shield me from the cold wind of night and keep the beetles from finding me. The temperature was dropping fast and a chill had set in. My scales were closed tight now to keep in what heat I had but I began to shiver. I was afraid I would die if it got too cold.
I moved rocks to make a lying place, hoping the rocks had stored enough heat to see me through the night, when off to the left I saw what looked like another white box. I ran over and hurriedly dug it out. This one had a moveable front like the other one, just like Gran’father said, but it was larger than the other one. I pulled it open and looked in. There wasn’t any food in this one either. Gran’father said food would be put inside and when the door was closed the food would be kept cold. Why didn’t they just leave the food outside in the cold?
I went back to my lying place and began to cover myself with warm rocks when I heard clicking noises. Sometimes the beetles prowled at night. They probably sensed my dried blood and would try to dig me out. I couldn’t stay awake all night fighting them and the cold. The only thing I could think of was the white box. Maybe if I hid in it the beetles wouldn’t get me and I could outlast the cold.
I climbed inside, curled up, and pulled the door closed. It was a tight fit and very uncomfortable because I had to curl my tail, which didn’t like being curled and ached all the time in the box. I thought it would get cold inside but it didn’t. I couldn’t understand why Gran’father said it got cold inside when you closed the door, but I was glad this one wasn’t cold.
I could hear beetles scratching on the box and I was very scared because they might open the door, but they never figured out how to do it. After a while, they gave up and went away. I ate one of my food pills, and as uncomfortable as I was, it made me feel better. I think I dozed during the night. Finally, when I thought about twelve times had passed, I peeked out and saw the sun and felt its early warmth. Maybe someday I could come back and take this white box back for Gran’father. It had saved my life.
I was tired and hungry and swallowed my breakfast pill. My muscles ached from the cramped position I was in all night. I had to be careful now, because I only had one food pill left. It wouldn’t be long before I’d be hungry again. Once my food bar was gone my tail would start to shrink as my stored food supply got used up and my stored water would be gone. I had to get back to the bunker. Blood had caked on my face and I needed to wash it off so it wouldn’t attract the beetles.
I spent several times searching for the path home. I was becoming exhausted from the effort and getting depressed that I’d never find my way back and the sun was beginning to set again. I wasn’t supposed to stay out in the Zone this long. I’d walked so far that there were no more piles with white boxes I could crawl into and no protection from the cold or the beetles. Desolate.
Then I saw one of my rock piles. It gave me new energy and lifted my spirits. All I had to do was follow it back to the bunker.
I’d been walking for many times and the darkness came quickly. It brought with it a quick drop in temperature. I had to hurry or I would die. I was getting weaker and approaching exhaustion, but I kept walking. I had to get back to the bunker…there was no other alternative.
In the distance I saw a small yellow light flickering–a fire. They had kept a fire for me. I yelled for Gran’father and ran, finally seeing the bunker. I could see Gran’father waving to me, his arms outstretched, reaching for me.
He held me close. “You had me worried, boy. When you didn’t return yesterday, I thought you were lost or killed by the beetles.”
“I got lost, Gran’father.”
“Didn’t you make marks on the ground like I told you?”
“I made some, but forgot to make more and got lost, but I did what you said and crossed back and forth until I found the markers”
“Good for you. I’m glad you’re back, boy. You’re all bloody.” He looked me over. “What happened to your cheek and your head?”
“I got sliced by a flying beetle.”
“A flying one, eh? What did you do?”
I shrugged and told him how I fought them off. I tried to make it seem like it was no big deal.
Gran’father nodded. “Two of them. Hmm. You don’t seem so cocky anymore. Well, I guess you’re growing up. You finished the Walking. Almost a man, now.”
I smiled. “I got some things for you Gran’father.” I reached to get them out of my pack but he stopped me.
“Tomorrow, boy. Tomorrow at the ceremony you can tell everyone about your great adventure. And then you get to go to the girl’s side. You’ll like that.”
I wasn’t so sure about that. I’d heard stories about what happens on the girl’s side after the Walking ceremony, but it confused me. The old men snickered when they talked about it.
“Gran’father, when I was in the Zone and saw all the rubble and how desolate it was and only the beetles survived the wars, I got to thinking about the launch tube in the gray room and what it meant.”
He gave me a questioning look. “What about it, boy?”
“I think I understand what you meant when you said, ‘After all these years, we’ve never learned.”
Gran’father grasped the key around his neck, looked at me, and smiled. “Well, I guess you really have grown up.” He put his arm around my shoulders and we walked into the long tunnel to the bunker.
It was the first time I’d ever seen him smile.