SLADERS. A PATH UNDER STARS

CHAPTER 1 (III)

"They wanted to kill you before ten minutes, and you finished the exam in five, you bastard," Agnuk mocked.

He looked me up and down, as if the answer were the easiest truth under heaven to prove.

I was silent in response, although I couldn't suppress one of our half smiles.

- You do not say anything? Agnuk snapped, raising his eyebrows.

I shrugged.

– What should I say?

"You've done it again," his friend declaimed, gesturing. Survive a wrestling exam where you show up drunk!

―I don't see any other way in which killing is more fun, doing it with a blunt force has already lost its fun.

We burst out laughing. It was time to celebrate with the few survivors. Tomorrow we would have to mourn the death of half of our companions, but that was the time to share among those of us who were still alive. Ten. At least eight still inside that joint. But we preferred to drink outdoors, taking in the air, like good villagers. Immersed in that feeling of relief that escapes death gives you, that shouts to you: "Celebrate life, because it will not always be yours."

"And not happy you started singing Run to the Hills," Agnuk added, still in disbelief. Songs of rebellion? ―he declaimed effusively―. Aren't you ashamed, Dakks?, to say goodbye to our southern neighbors!

We smile.

I couldn't have found a better Iron Maiden song for that moment. It wasn't entirely on purpose, but somehow he hadn't been able to control the disgust he felt towards them anymore. We owed them nothing more than the misery in which they forced us to live. Stupid southerners and stupid diplomacy.

I sighed.

"At least I had a good time."

No one could hold back their laughter anymore.

"Everything is more fun when you're drunk," Agnuk conceded. Although I maintain my hypothesis that you come from another planet.

I wouldn't get into that argument again.

"Mr. Flick liked it." I defended myself.

"He likes the show, you know. People who kill like that, normal, seem dull to him.

We were still leaning on the door of the Gaucok, one of the rancidest, dirtiest and cheapest joints in the only place that could afford taverns outside the walls, the Kodra corridor. It was a large commercial street that linked to East Kalendula, one of the four gates of the wall of Ajax, and the only one that remained open, although guarded, all night.

We used to go there for cheap alcohol. To tell the truth, it was the place where we sold all the bottles we stole from the markets of Ajax. They didn't pay well. But it was fun. And because of our loyalty, Gaucok was the only bar in Ajax where we drank for free. It is true that most of the bottles to be tasted had been conveniently discarded by the public health committee and other merchants, but it is no less true that it was the only thing we could afford.

Yes. There was hunger there. But we had both learned to love that land as our own lives. The musty smell of misery on the unpaved paths, and in the low buildings inserted between the diffuse trees of the meadows that preceded the jungle. The torches lit on the roads, illuminating the night. The low houses, with a maximum of two floors, and built entirely of wood, which were, along with the crops west of Ajax and the insect farms, the only thing our families lived on.

That diffuse labyrinth that took shape on that street leading to the big city was his home. But they also learned to love that old city. Because, as things were, he had always done his best to keep the villages alive, even in the darkest moments. And Ajax represented, in essence, what each of its inhabitants embodied: loyalty, collectivity and courage.