Hey hey, guys, gals, and in between pals! We’ve gotten to our 7th Wildcard Wednesday! This week I bring you the first chapter of a story I was writing for National Novel Writing Month. This is a follow-up post to the Introduction of Unseen Adaptations and Wildcard Wednesday #3 and I would advise you to check it out before reading this chapter. This is a post-apocalyptic, coming-of-age story of two boys going through the Rite of Adaptation.

These chapters may not have specific names, content warnings, or pictures until I am focusing on this storyline, so viewer discretion is advised.

My apologies for this going up late, I thought I had scheduled it.

Hope you enjoy the show!
~ Chance

I glanced past the entrance to the narrow alley I had hidden in to avoid my father’s Warders. I had been in my temporary safe haven for nearly ten minutes and still I thought my heart was going to beat out of my chest while I waited to see if they would pass again. I leaned my head on the wall and caught my breath before slipping out of my hiding place and into a passing crowd. Not that I blended in well in my mismatched excuse of street clothes. I worked with what I could find around the manor, but the quality of cloth alone made me stand out among the common folk in their shabby clothes.

I split from the group when we reached the crowded entrance to the market square, pulling my hood down to avoid being recognized by a passing guard. It was a bit warm for the cloak, but nothing else was going to hide my distinctive features. Black hair wasn’t uncommon among the Shifters, but I had never met another person with a midnight blue shimmer like mine. Even when others tried to mimic my appearance, their shifting could never get the same effect.

I stared at the map posted on the wall outside the bustling square, trying to make out where I was with little success. I had turned down help from several strangers and interacted with passersby as little as possible. My father had people in his employ all over the city and I could never be certain who was a friendly commoner and who was a plainclothes Warder. It was better to be lost and look like a moron than face the wrath my father would rain down on me if he found out I was at the market. 

I decided to test my luck and wandered through the boisterous crowd with no clue where I was going. I moved with the flow of the crowd, a twig in a steadily moving river of bodies. The sights, sounds, and smells overwhelmed me, the world blurring as the crowd continued to push me along. I made a few attempts to escape the throngs of people with limited success. I finally stumbled my way out of the crowd and sat on a public bench so my head could stop spinning. I expected this to be overwhelming, but the scope was beyond anything I experienced at even the most well-attended societal parties.

“You look kinda outta place, friend.” A boy my age wearing dusty clothes and scuffed boots approached me with a grin that spelled trouble. His deep orange hair was a mess, though it looked purposefully styled that way.

“What makes you say that? And I’m not your friend.” I nervously tugged on the hem of my hood.

The disheveled boy looked me up and down, shaking his head with a chuckle. “Sure thing, pal. I say that because you look like you dove into a Traveller’s clothes basket and walked out with whatever fool costume pieces that stayed on. Dunno what look you were going for, but you should reconsider your life choices. Who’re you hiding from wearing a getup like that?”

I stood and crossed my arms, taking note of any escape routes and finding limited options. “I’m not your pal and I’m not hiding. I just have a terrible fashion sense.” 

He stared at me for a beat before bursting into laughter. “Hoo boy, bud. I don’t know who you’re trying to fool, but I can’t just let you walk about looking like you got mauled by a stage play. C’mon, I can find you some good replacements.” He extended a hand and grinned at me.

I took a step away from him with clenched fists. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to trust a stranger to lead me through an unfamiliar place. And I am not your bud.”

He took a step toward me. “Fine. I’m Vax, he/him.”

“Anak, he/him as well.” I glanced at his hand. “If you think this changes your stranger status, you’re mistaken.”

He huffed and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Fine. Be that way. I was gonna help you get out of this rodak’s nest, but you can rot in here for all I care.” He turned toward the crowd.

I grabbed his arm tightly. “No. Wait.” 

Vax looked at me in a confused way. “You move fast, comrad. Ow, ow! Loosen the grip, man.”

I squeezed harder. “My name is Anak and that is what you will call me.” I released him from my grasp and took a few calming breaths.

Vax rubbed his arm with a scowl. “Okay, okay. I hear you. I was just trying to joke around. Lighten up.” He looked at the reddened handprint around his upper arm. “C’mon. There is a good place not far from here.”

Vax led me into the grouping of stalls filled with quickly moving people and shouting vendors. I tried to catch sight of the wares we were passing, but I was barely keeping up with Vax as it was. I dodged hurried shoppers and whipped around the corner I saw Vax turn. I ran into the solidly built teenager and stumbled to keep from falling into anyone else.

“Hey! You kept up! I wasn’t sure you would. Market’s a little busier than usual. Probably all those tourists who think they’ve got what it takes to get through that Rite thing.” He sneered at some of the passing visitors.

I glared at the back of his head. “They aren’t tourists. I doubt anyone goes through the Rite of Adaptation for the fun of it.” I tried to keep my offense hidden, but I knew my tone gave me away.

He grinned over his shoulder at me. “You sound like a tourist.” He laughed when I scowled at him. “Relax, Anak. I’m just kidding. You really do need to grow a sense of humor.” He began down the lane we had turned onto and I followed him despite my growing annoyance with my new companion.

I walked next to him in the less crowded lane. “I have a sense of humor. I just don’t find it funny to make light of something as serious as becoming an Adapted. Especially with the monster sieges.” 

Vax rolled his eyes at me. “Monster sieges. I think they’re blown outta proportion. There just aren’t that many people reporting them anymore. Not down here among us common folk.” I didn’t like the knowing glint in his eye, but he stopped short in front of a clothing and accessory vendor. “Ah, here we go. This is the place.”

I walked around the stall with a baffled frown. None of the patterns seemed to match what I was used to seeing beyond the Gate. The vendors who came up to my family’s level wore bright colors and garish patterns. “Is there anything more interesting to wear?”

Vax tugged me away from the now annoyed shopkeeper with a nervous laugh. “Ignore my friend. He’s new in town.” He yanked me behind a clothing rack. “Are you insane? Don’t insult the product while the seller is right there. What’s wrong with you?”

I felt my face heat and I tugged at the hem of my hood again. “This isn’t what I thought I would find when I came down here. The tents and stalls are so vibrant.”

Vax shook his head. “Of course the stalls are garish. How else are they going to attract customers? Those tents and banners are not cheap and their colors have a lot to do with that. No one down here can afford things like that. You aren’t from around here, are you?”

I looked around nervously but we were fairly isolated in the corner he’d pulled me into. “No, not really. I thought this was more what I would find in the market.” I gestured to my outfit with a sigh.

He shook his head at me and pinched the bridge of his nose. “So, you from beyond the Wall or above the Gate? With this level of mismatching, I’m going to guess above the Gate.” 

I gestured with my head toward the market’s exit. “Above the Gate. I wanted to come see what it was like down here. My father doesn’t let me wander around down here.”

Vax shook his head with a laugh. “You Gaters have the weirdest idea of what we wear down here. Tell you what, I’ll pick some clothes, you foot the bill. Sound good? Great.”

I examined my new clothes as I tried to make the unfamiliar garments fit properly. The cloth was far lower quality than I was used to and it was irritating my skin, but I did feel like I fit in better. “How do I look?”

Vax looked me up and down, turning me enough times to leave me dizzy. “Yeah, yeah. Looks good. I gave the shopkeep the coins, so we can head out.” He tugged on my arm.

“Oh, but I wanted to thank the owner for helping us pick things out.” I tried to pull my arm away as he dragged me from the stall.

“Don’t worry about that. Shopkeepers don’t usu-”

“Hey! You gotta pay for that stuff!” Vax forced me to duck as a jar crashed on the ground in front of us, blue smoke billowing out of it. “Get back here!”

I glared at the grinning boy next to me. “What is going on, Vax?”

He opened his mouth to speak, but grabbed me by both arms and spun me away from the fast approaching shopkeeper. “Talk later. Run now.” He yelped when another jar smashed at our feet and blue smoke blocked everything from view. 

It burned to keep my eyes open and my lungs were refusing to accept the thick air. I fell to my knees and attempted to shield my face in the hope I could find a way out of the suffocating cloud. The edges of my vision began to darken and my ears were ringing so loud I thought my eardrums might burst. I had all but resigned myself to my fate when I was lifted from the ground. I couldn’t open my eyes enough to see who my rescuer was or where I was being taken. I didn’t care if it meant getting out of the acrid smoke. I could hear distant shouts as we disappeared into the depths of the market.

When I was finally set down again, I coughed so hard I thought I was going to throw up, puffs of blue smoke escaping my lungs in heavy clouds that sank to the ground immediately. I could still taste whatever was in the jars and no amount of spitting was fixing that.

I tried to figure out where I had been taken, but all I could make out was vague box shapes staked on top of each other. I looked up at the blurry person standing next to me, their face covered with a black and red mask. “Thanks for the rescue, my friend.” My voice was scratchy and speaking made my throat burn. My appreciation faded when it was Vax under the mask. “You.”

He smiled sheepishly as he coughed out a blue puff. “Me. Listen, I can explain what, oop!” He lept back when I lunged at him, not that I could aim well through the tears streaming down from my burning eyes. “Hey, hey! I’m trying to explain here!”

I glared in his general direction. “Explain what? That you tricked me into giving you my money and then used me to steal these things?” I gestured to my clothes which had a blue dusting over it.

Vax made sure to stay out of my reach as I took another blind swing. “If you had just left when I said we should, we would have been fine. Yipe!” 

I managed to grab one of his ankles when he went to jump back again, dragging him to the ground with me. He kicked my hand to free himself before scurrying behind what I could now see was a stack of crates. I struggled to my feet, panting from the effort just breathing took. “If you had just paid him, we wouldn’t have needed to be fine!”

He gestured for me to quiet down and nervously glanced at the boarded up windows. “Listen, I get that you’re mad, but look at it from my perspective. You got plenty of money. That shopkeep’s got plenty of money. I’m just a poor kid trying to not starve out here. Not that you would understand what that’s like. You probably never went hungry a single day of your life up there behind your Opal Gate. But you need to keep your voice down or the guards will find us.”

I threw one of the stolen shoes at him. “So what? I’ll just explain that you tricked me into being part of this and surely they’ll just let me go when I give the clothes back.”

He caught the shoe and immediately threw it back at me. “Shows how much you know about how life works down here for us common people. You think they’ll care that you weren’t a willing accomplice? You’re wearing the stolen goods. There is no way they’ll believe your story. Not when you’re brought in with me.”

I swatted the shoe away and attempted to get the second one off with far less grace than the first. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you boys are in a lot of trouble.”

I saw Vax’s face go pale as he hid behind the crates despite knowing it would do him no good. I looked over my shoulder at the annoyed guard standing in the doorway. He stepped aside as four other guards stomped their way in, one grabbing me by each arm while the other two had to wrangle Vax.

I struggled against them with no result. “But I didn’t do anything wrong! I can explain everything, I promise.”

The guard shrugged in a bored way. “You can explain when we get to the jail. Not that it will do you any good after the Council’s declaration about zero tolerance while there are so many visitors to the city. Next time, don’t trust a street rat. Take them away.”

The guards pulled me out of the musty storage room. “I’m not a visitor, though! I just came down from the Opal Gate to see what the market was like.”

He shrugged again with a laugh. “Oh, good. Then you can be someone else’s problem.”