Songbirds After Dark

Kiera III

To be perfectly honest, I was never much of one for cities. Just too high-energy, it's always felt like everything was being sucked out of me. I don't think I've ever felt more alone than when I'm surrounded by a million other lost souls. But sometimes it can't be helped, can it? But still. I couldn't wait to get the hell out of Korrhburg, every second I spent there reminded me of why I had taken to the wilderness in the first place.

Even in this bizarre, surreal version of the world, there was something intoxicating about the wild. It surrounded you and breathed air into your lungs in a way that man-made things never could. Even if she had been ugly and in squalor, I still think mother nature would be better company than most people. But Addie wasn't so bad; I had definitely had worse companions. For the most part she kept her thoughts to herself, I could learn to live with that. But here, I could see how much better she was built for city life than I was. She danced around others in a street while trying to do the same made me feel almost dizzy.

It had gotten dark now. The longer I spent in this place, the faster the days seemed to pass me by. Addie had slept last night, something that I had long since stopped doing. Hopefully soon enough she would too, and we could keep moving. But for now, it was hard to begrudge her some peace. I remembered how confused I had been at first. Of course, it didn't help that I had been dropped in the middle of another southern city, and not a single soul bothered to tell me what the hell was going on. But hey, I had more or less figured it out in the end. That's something people are better at than animals; we can change so easily when it comes down to it. My parents had kept rabbits in hutches in our backyard when I was a child. They only lived three or four years. Those things were creatures of habit. They were born, they bred, then they died, never even once having ventured out of our yard.

I don't think I could do something like that. A life that simple, spent in the darkness of a man-made creation? It sounded terrifying to me. Soon enough the walls of the buildings we passed felt like a cage with no door to open. Addie shot me a vaguely concerned look.

"You doin' okay?" she asked. "You're lookin' kinda twitchy. Wanna take a breather?" And here I had been thinking I was doing a good job at repressing my emotions; apparently not.

"I'll be fine in a few seconds." I told her. She didn't look like she believed a word I said, and guided me to the side of the road despite my protests. A frog-man gave us a worried look and began to make his way towards us, but Addie waved off his concern and sent him on his way.

"Wha's wrong?" She asked me. Wide eyes made her look cartoonishly genuine. She had this look that reminded me of an old Hollywood actress. I remembered reading an article about how dark most of their lives were. It was getting pretty hard to lie to those eyes.

"Nothing." I tried to tell her. She still didn't buy it, that much was clear. "Cities make me a little anxious, that's all. I grew up pretty much in the middle of nowhere, remember? Do you need anything else while we're here? It's going to be at least a few weeks before we hit another city."

"Oh." Addie said. "They do markets here? Like, the open-air kind?" Well, that was an unexpected request.

"I've heard of it, but I don't think I've ever seen one. But to be fair, I haven't spent that much time in Korrhburg. Want to ask someone else?"

Around an hour later, we were still none the wiser. At that point I was practically itching to get the hell out of the city, so I suggested that we just keep an eye open for it on our way out. She looked a bit disappointed, but agreed, taking glances from side to side as we made out way out. The second we were out the gates, I felt about a thousand pounds lifted off of my chest. The road into Korrhburg was sandy and bare, so I found a few rocks and used them to spread the map on the ground. "So we're here," I pointed at the red dot marking Korrhburg on the map. "And we want to be here," I pointed to the coast, just south of New New York. "So, let's get going."

"So soon?" Addie asked as I began rolling up the map again. I tied it off with a bit of string and tucked it into the tote.

"Time's running out for me, Addie. I'm pretty much at the point where it's now or never, and I'd really prefer the former." we were both quiet for a few heartbeats.

"How long d'you think you have left?"

"No way to tell," I shrugged. "But whatever higher power's got control is going to have to drag me out kicking and screaming." Addie tossed back her head and laughed.

"Let's hope it don't come to that," she said, brushing her hair behind her shoulder. "But if it does? I'll find you."

"Can you really promise that?" I said. "Who knows how this works, you might not remember me at all."

"Oh, I'll remember you all right. Maybe not up front, but you'll always be bouncin' around in my head. Kinda hard to forget a lady who pulls a knife on you right up front, never been on a first date quite that bad," she said. I smiled a bit, and she leaned over. "For real, though. I'm gonna find you, and I ain't givin' up until I do."

"That's sweet," I said, "but it's beyond our control, isn't it?" Addie opened her mouth to argue, but I was already putting away the map.