Zero Magnitude – Snippet #1

Flashback to Devika's Childhood

“Run faster, Devi!”

The trees blurred by as Devika Sharma ran barefoot through the dark forests of Coppice. Thunder shook the ground and the rain fell in great drenching slants.

She wore plastic beads around her wrists, and they shook in frenzied rhythm with her steps.

She didn’t know how much faster she could run. She hated the never-ending trees, the shadows, the wetness.

She could hardly see.

“Come on!” a little boy’s voice shouted.

And then she spotted a dark hand reaching out for her.

Rajinder—a little boy her age. Nine or ten. His black hair was matted in a wet clump over his face, and his red cricket jersey was soaked.

He grabbed her hand forcefully.

“We have to keep going!” he cried.

Devika found renewed strength and followed him. His hand was wet and slippery.

They slid down a muddy path. The mud went up to Devi’s ankles. Her feet burned from running across soil and rock.

Then the ground sloped upward again. They climbed a small foothill as if it were a mountain. Twice Devika slid backward, but Rajinder grabbed her and pulled her up. They used the trees as support, clawing through the mud until they reached the top of the hill.

Through the broken trees, they spotted a soup of orange lights blinking in the darkness like bokeh from an unfocused camera.

“We’re almost there,” Rajinder said.

“Do you think he’s still following us?” Devika asked, panting.

She looked back. The forest was as dark as the night. The brownish white trees were dull in the rain, like rows of evil teeth.

“Too hard to tell,” Rajinder said, hands on his knees. “You going to be okay?”

She leaned on his shoulder to catch her breath. “If it’s just a little while longer, I’ll—”

A squeal stopped her.

She whimpered as Rajinder grabbed her.

The ground shook, this time from another kind of thunder. Not too far off, several thick trees snapped like twigs.

And then snorting.

Sniffing.

And more squealing. Guttural, gut-wrenching squealing.

Devi fell face-first into the mud. She pulled herself up but slid forward, her back hitting a tree.

The beads on her wrist got stuck on a branch. She tried to untangle them, but the smooth surface of the beads was covered in mud.

Rajinder helped her up.

“Let the beads go,” he said.

She clutched them close to her chest. She couldn’t let them go. Not the last traces she had of her mother and father. Without them, she’d have nothing to remember them by.

“No!” she cried. “It’s the only thing I have from my parents!”

“You’ve got your memories,” Rajinder said. “It’s more than I have of my parents.”

“Please, don’t take them!”

“Devi, they’re making too much noise!” Rajinder said. He ripped the beads off her wrist, and she screamed as they landed in the mud.

She dove for the beads, but before she could grab them, a black boot stomped the ground, covering them.

Boots.

The smell of strong musk, body odor and crusted sweat.

Devi looked up slowly, past the boots, past the potbelly covered in leather and rings, past the chains and shackles hanging from a belt, past the chainsaw gripped by two bulky arms… to the face of an Argus.

A pink-skinned pig with floppy ears, a silver ring in his nose, and two sawed off, broken tusks. Its orange eyes were like fire in the rain, and it snarled at them as it revved its chainsaw.

***

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