Ch. 1: Desolate

I looked around at our small village. In one word you could describe the community as desolate. Everything seemed like trash. The empty houses battered and worn, the gray gloomy sky overhead, the barely growing shrubbery. I glanced at the barbed fence at my left and looked around at the mud on our side.

'There's no future here' I thought.

Corbin was right. Life here was meaningless. I looked past the barbed wire fence into the distant blue sky. As far as the eye could see was sand. I sighed while trudging through the muck to a run-down shack near the border. Inside lying on a rat-eaten blanket and straw pile lay Corbin.

"Have you thought it over?" Corbin's voice was rough and haggard. He coughed a while after his one sentence. Outside the shack I heard the distant sounds of the brothel across the street. I looked around me at the meager living area and asked again, "Do you really think it will make a difference?"

"I don't know, but it has to be better than here." Corbin's crippled body tried leaning up on one elbow. His entire form was covered in mud and feces but his bright blue eyes shown with a hopeful sense of stubborn pride. "You're the only one who isn't complacent enough to stay in this lifestyle. Take Richie and go. You know how to defend yourself - don't allow our race to go extinct."

"But what if I fail? I'm not even sure what to do once I'm there."

"All you have to do is live. Go and live . . . please." Corbin's eyes pleaded and tears began to form. I reached down and held his hand in my own.

"I won't let you down, brother."