“You could at least watch so it doesn’t burn,” grunted Rolland as he looked in disgust at the piece of meat that had been slapped on his plate. It was completely blackened thanks to its prolonged exposure to the fire, and its noxious smell turned his stomach.

  “The gentleman would prefer his meat to be prepared medium rare, perhaps?” came the sarcastic reply.

  Rolland did not bother to respond. He turned around and took a few short steps away from the stench that was inundating the gloomy underground cavity designated as their dining room. He grabbed the hunk of flesh and brought it up to his mouth without looking at it. It took considerable effort to eat it with his sparse, rotting set of teeth. The scorched meat crunched between his jaws and, when he finally managed to get it down his throat, it left him with an unpleasant aftertaste of the gasoline which had obviously been used to light the fire. But for some reason, it didn’t bother him. He rather enjoyed the taste of his filet of rat meat.

  Rolland Benedic had been a moderately successful professor of Russian philology until the Wave had destroyed everything that had meant anything to him, redefining his life in one of the worst ways imaginable. First, he’d lost the little family he’d had left. His father died in a fire brought on by the Wave, and his brother was shot to death during the war. Then when the Secure Zones were established and the peace treaty was signed with the North, he discovered that his only talent, his command of the Russian language, was no longer a way for him to earn a living. He found himself having to beg, unable to find a job, and his survival instinct had forced him to commit acts that were previously not in keeping with his moral standards. He’d killed, robbed, deceived, and done anything he could to keep from succumbing to the profound desperation he harbored inside him. He had wanted to die on many occasions, seeing death as a means of escape from the suffering, but he had never tried to commit suicide.

  How he’d become part of one of the gangs of indigents that clashed over territorial disputes all over London’s underground he simply could not fathom. The sewers and the subway lines were the setting of a silent war in which he was forced to take part. The last three years had been a succession of blurry, dark images that seemed more like a nightmare than actual memories to him.

  He finished his meal and walked lazily up a cold, damp passageway. Every now and then his feet sloshed through puddles. He arrived at a subway platform within their territory that had fallen into disuse and sat down on the edge of it, his legs dangling over the side as he thought about what he was going to do next. He hadn’t been there for long when he heard the sound of footsteps coming from the darkness of the tunnel where the subway trains used to run. Someone was approaching. Rolland looked around. There were three men warming their hands over a barrel inside of which something was burning and belching out copious amounts of smoke. The steps were coming closer. Rolland thought about warning the men since whoever was approaching could be someone from an enemy gang.

  A tall man dressed in a black raincoat emerged from the blackness, looking as if on a mission. The man looked up and down the platform, not seeming the least bit interested in him or the other three men. But when his eyes locked on him, Rolland felt for a moment like the man was seeing right through him, looking into his very core. The man in the raincoat just kept walking, that same odd look of determination on his face.

  “Hey, you!” shouted one of the men from the trio warming their hands. “You can’t be in here. This zone is ours.”

  The stranger kept walking as if he hadn’t heard a thing. He’d crossed more than a third of the length of the platform, and Rolland was now looking at his backside. The raincoat had two vertical cuts in it than ran from his shoulder blades to his mid back. They weren’t tears or rips, but rather perfectly straight lines that looked like they were part of the design of the dark-colored garment.

  “Let’s go after him, Rolland,” said a tall, bald man he recognized as Jake, a member of his gang. “No one goes through our territory without paying.”

  The four jumped onto the subway track and had no trouble catching up with the stranger who’d not changed his slow and steady pace.

  “I said you can’t go through here,” repeated Jake threateningly. Rolland noticed the stranger’s raincoat was impeccable. It was nothing like the filthy, worn-out rags the London underground’s inhabitants typically wore. “You stop right now.”

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Jake reached out his arm, intending to force the intruder to stop. Rolland wasn’t sure if Jake had even touched the man, but the instant his hand was above the stranger’s shoulder Jake was suddenly flying through the air, and he landed on the floor several yards away. The intruder hadn’t even appeared to move—though he had continued walking—but something large and long had moved on his back so quickly that it was like a blur. Rolland looked at his gang-mate lying flat out on the ground with no signs of life. Stunned by what he’d just seen, Rolland was afraid to move a muscle. So he just stood there, staring at the intruder, letting out his breath with a quiet expletive.

  Two massive black wings emerged from the slits in the raincoat. Its feathers were dark and sleek, something like the wings of a gigantic eagle.

  Not waiting around to find out what any of this meant, the two men who’d been with Jake took off running in the opposite direction. Rolland quickly followed suit, motivated by a visceral fear. What he’d just witnessed made no sense. The panic he was beginning to feel had his heart beating furiously. He ran as fast as he could after the bums until they were all far from the platform. The first of the bums tripped and fell, and the other one kept running at full speed. Rolland didn’t see the bump in the ground; he tripped over the same bump the first bum did and also fell flat on his face. He shook his head, a bit stunned, and as he placed his hands on the ground to push himself up he felt strong vibrations beneath him. At precisely that moment, a low, rumbling sound swept through the tunnel.

  The other man furrowed his brow, his head snapping quickly from side to side as he looked for the source of the sound. The thunderous noise was getting louder and louder, sounding at short, regular intervals. Whatever it was, it had to be something really big—enormous—and it was quickly getting closer. They both stood up and looked at one another in bewilderment. The noise was gaining in intensity and its rhythm was steadily increasing as it echoed off the walls. Rolland’s fear and the feeling of disorientation caused by his fall kept him from determining exactly where it was coming from.

  He began running toward the other man, finally able to discern that the racket was originating from the direction they’d been running before they fell. He had no intention of sticking around to find out what was coming. They had to get back to the platform and get out of there.

  “Run!” he shouted, frightened out of his mind.

  He looked back and saw shadows moving in the darkness. He took off running back toward the platform. Fortunately they hadn’t gone far. They made it to the platform and, though winded, managed to get up off the track. They lay there on the platform for a moment, exhausted. The floor was still trembling with a rhythmic, thunderous rumbling.

  They had no time to catch their breath. Within a few seconds, a spectacular parade of people marched up the subway track. Their steps were perfectly synchronized and they proceeded in straight rows that took up the width of the track. They were all dressed in black raincoats, just like the first one who’d laid Jake out flat. And they all had the same severe expression on their faces.

  Jake’s body was still lying in the middle of the track. When the first row got to him, they made no attempt to go around him, or even to avoid trampling him in the off-chance that he was still alive. Rolland could hear the bones breaking beneath their heavy boots as they stepped right on top of him as if he were a piece of trash. Their advance was unstoppable. Soon the entire subway track was filled with these strange men in black raincoats. The first ones had already arrived at the far end of the platform and were disappearing into the blackness of the tunnel as more and more men were appearing at the other end. There had to have been hundreds of them—perhaps thousands. And they all had two vertical slits in the back of their raincoats.

  A long while passed, and still the unidentified men continued their march down the subway track. A figure appeared on one side, breaking up their perfect symmetry. He was shorter than they were and was not keeping time with the rest of them. His movements were quite different. Completely lacking the military cadence, he was instead agile and spontaneous. And, unlike the rest of them, he was all in black and was not wearing a raincoat. His head was covered by a hood and his body was covered by a long cloak that cascaded down to his feet. Rolland was intrigued by this hooded man and followed him with his eyes. He was the only one who stopped in front of Jake’s body, crouching down beside him for a moment. Then he stood up and looked toward the platform.

  Rolland held his breath when he saw those blue eyes pointing directly at him from under the hood. Though his eyes were the only part of his face that could be seen, Rolland still had the undeniable though incomprehensible sensation that the hooded man was smiling at him.

  “It would not hurt you to be a bit more careful with my beloved Minors,” he said jovially to the others parading along the subway track. Then he bowed to Rolland, slipped back into the masses and was lost among them.

  Rolland continued watching the constant march of these unknown men, until the last of them disappeared into the tunnel.

  Other than the hooded man, no one had even seemed to notice him.