24
The Wastelands
Cap strained against the blinding sun rising beyond the eastern crest. Once, he’d enjoyed the sunrise. No one had ever had to tell him to wake before light. He could see the world best when fewer eyes were upon it.
Now, with the morning ebb of the sun, came the hunger. In the early days here, he told himself he’d eventually grow used to the pang that ripped through his belly, stabbing straight to his soul. He never did. The ache never lessened. While he’d forgotten many of his needs, never this one, the most basic need of all.
They were on day three of no food. Anywhere else, this would’ve been an annoyance, but here, where men went to be forgotten, to be something other than men, it was life or death. The guards relished granting the news on the first day. They’d alw
