The Woman fell silent to his calling.

  Marcos jumped to his feet and pounded at the door until his fists were bruised and bloodied. Even then, he kept pounding until the wooden frames burst apart sending shards of wood and metal around the living room. Through the holes in the wood he could see The Woman standing over the basin, tears flooding her eyes.

  Fury clawed at his stomach and poisoned his heart. His eyes glazed as he burst through the door, his hand clenched and high in the air ready to swing downwards; addressed to The Woman turning her eyes and flinching with fright.

  He exited the eastern passage and came to the split in the road where left led to At War and right to At Love. He washed away the delusion in his mind and was still driven by some primal uncommon sense.

  As he was about to enter the building, the corner of his sight was caught by a sudden lack of expectance. He pressed his body against the brick work and eased his sight past the corner; a sense, not of suspicion, but one of genuine intrigue cast a spell on him.

  It was the Behemoth who by all accord should not be expected to be found where he was and of with whom that he was. Marcos fixed his sight and focused on the two shapes in the distance. He couldn’t hear the crux of their conversation but he could make out the immediacy in the voice of the old man wearing a white coat.

  The Behemoth stood towering over the man but seemed to take in every word that he said, nodding in concurrence and apparently taking some kind of direction. When the two moved from the shadows into the small courtyard that divided War and Love, Marcos slipped back behind the frame and waited until they passed his sight before this new sensation of intrigue silenced the call of The Woman and directed him upon the dusted footprints of the Behemoth and the old man of science walking in conspicuous tandem through the hallways of Love until they came across a young boy holding a white sheet, sitting alone, running loose gravel through the gaps in his fingers.

  Marcos watched on in the distance as The Behemoth and The Elderly Scientist kneeled down to the boy’s height and The Behemoth laid a hand on his shoulder. They were speaking to the boy but were so far that Marcos could make out not even the intent usually masked in the tone of one’s speech.

  He found it odd that The Behemoth should only moments before a grand collection, be far from the command of his generals and more so, for him to be abreast with strangeness and secrecy in the confidence of nameless number men and who exactly was this boy. And what words did The Behemoth collect from this Child and keep as note in hand?

  Marcos was startled by the sound of generals calling into the open air; aligning their Sons to march. The sound of cheering filled the mid-morning as the children of other states clapped their hands and danced about freely. Mothers ran about struggling to keep them under control and to return them to their proper states of Love, Work and Peace.

  Marcos’ focus was broken by a line of Children who rushed down the passage, through the courtyard and past Marcos, into the main building towards their classes. Their Mother followed shortly behind with a stern look on her face apologising absently to Marcos, careful not to look him directly in the eyes. Marcos pulled his stomach in; backing against the wall, lifting his arms and allowing The Children to run past.

  When silence returned, he looked to the distance again but the men and the child were gone. He didn’t know of their direction so instead he made his own, heading back through the small courtyard where in its centre, several Mothers fought to free a web of Children tangled in netting. He passed The Children and entered the passage through to the main courtyard where hundreds of readied soldiers awaited their instruction to march out into the cold grey August morning and fulfil their purpose; to kill and to collect.

  A cumbersome hand slapped on his shoulder.

  “A mind that ponders has feet that wander. What are you doing away from where I left you old friend?” said The Behemoth.

  Marcos was stuck for reason. His mind flashed with the image of the two men conspiring, or as he had thought.

  “Finding my way back” he said closing any curiosity.

  The two men walked together down the line of Sons and stood at either side of the gated doors that led through the foyer and out into The City streets.

  The War General commanded the colonels, who commanded their Sons, who commanded their focus, which commanded their feet and as one, they marched through the courtyard, out through the foyer and lined the great wall that divided The Collective, from The Famine, commanding attention, submission and awe.

  Marcos and The Behemoth followed and out on the streets they divided their teams and sharpened their focus.

  “Be war, always! There is no safe passage, there is no gingerly threat. Never lessen your focus. One is war! Be always one! Be always war! Love as one!” screamed The Behemoth to the hundreds of Sons and White Hearts before him.

  The men and women raised their cruel instruments into the air and cheered, “Live as you love, live as you love, live as you love” in constant recurrence with their instruments piercing the air as their boots stomped the loose earth and trembling concrete.

  Marcos and The Behemoth joined The War General passing first the enormous outer structure of The Nest, and then moving through the centre of town where the morning bustle was steadily gaining momentum.

  People were emerging from crawl spaces beneath buildings, between the cracks in the sidewalk that every night swallowed the evening rains, from behind mounds of shrubbery and plastic netting, from within burnt out wrecks and from the dark winding alleys that even under the brightest sun; hidden by a cold grey August sky, cast a shadow so grand that one could not see their own palms clasping to their eyes as their fear enveloped their conscious senses and they collapsed into an insignificant heap at their feet.

  They crawled then from the blackened windows that kept secrets of their residence leaving only the void visible to the morning light as thick metal gratings slid away from the frame allowing its contents to slip out into the day and make business of their absence. They spawned from the giant cathedral where stagnation made its bed with promise and the stains of abandon and disbelief bore mockingly into the last dregs of conscious sanity. They scurried from the outskirts of town where at night, the freezing cold blusters one’s living into death and even under a tower of fire, to close one’s eyes is a gamble as to whether they should open again in the morn. And they loomed from the cavernous wrecks of towers that aligned The City streets and from the nether of bridges and doorways where the wind and viscous packs of vagabonds would never reach.

  They came from every side; from every up, from every down, weakened by the hunger in their stomach that scathed their skin and muscle but exhorted nefariously by the unrelenting famine in their minds.

  The three men surrounded by a guard of White Hearts made their way through the traffic of scavenging humans. They learned in their environment; The Famined ones; like obedient pets, and always returned to their same grounds waiting attentively to receive their portion of information each day. With it, they scurried back to their domesticated holes and wished and wondered the rest of the hours in a day away, their minds doped on information, they festered in their dank dwellings nursing their cravings and willing the next half sun to arrive for their next fix.

  Marcos was no stranger to this sight. He walked under the fall of every sun with The Woman by his side to his dwellings that overlooked the entire stretch of The City from the prodigious Nest whose immense walls cast high into the heavens, to the miscreant bridge; that in the night, shuffled devilry in and out of the darkest regions.

  The Famined too were conditioned to The Collective. They moved and cowered out of harm’s way not wanting to draw upon any unfavourable affection; more than what they knew in their rancid degenerate states, they deserved.

  They were conditioned to The Collective, yes, but they were hardened and savagely frightened of the White Hearts, the men and women who wore atrocity on their chests. And just as sugar disappeared in water, so too did courage in The Famined at the sight of that vile symbol that perforated through the cold grey August morning.

  The three men under heavy guard came to a square where they were greeted by an old man with a thick grey beard that carried down to his sunken chest. His face was drawn, weighed by the carriage of every day that he had lived, but this old man; a revered collector, would not let go of a single second. He knew everything that seemed so unimportant and his trade was in everything that was.

  The Behemoth approached the Old Drunk Bastard and shook his hand vigorously almost lifting him off his feet in the process. The old man looked to Marcos and pulled on his long white beard and nodded his head in a show of welcome and respect.

  The three men walked with the Old Drunk Bastard brushing open a tarpaulin cover that dressed an open doorway that led through to the Child Market.

  The entrance was long and there was little room to wiggle one’s self passed the traffic coming from the counter way. The path was lit by candles that sat high on the walls flickering under the gusts of wind that snuck through the covering. As they neared the opening, their ears narrowed on what at first travelled as faint whisper and upon the further creeping of tiny steps, unravelled into a raucous banter of laughing, conversing, orating, lamenting and bartering at every corner of the floor.

  “Welcome, tis a grand day indeed ta deal in fairy tales. Come on in a grab a seat. Can I offer you some Poitin? Tis lethal stuff it is. Till strip da worry right outta ya. Celia brewed it before she died, bless her soul. Sure she’s with me in spirit now, she is” said the Old Drunk Bastard laughing and tripping over the exhilaration that caught at his feet as a matted old dog named Ruff sent him stumbling forward into a pile of boxes leaning against a brick wall.

  “Watch yourselves gentlemen. Gravity works a little funny in dese walls. Now, take a seat. Hold a sec. Seamus; would ya get rid of dat feckin mongrel, I almost gave me arse a fuckin sun shower. Now, what can I do for you giant fuckers dis morning?” asked The Old Drunk Bastard kicking the dog along.

  “Children” said Macros bluntly.

  “I like your boss man here. He wouldn’t fuck a monkey on a Sunday” he said.

  Marcos looked to The Behemoth who just shook his head in a pay no mind kind of tribute to the ramblings of The Old Drunk Bastard. The old man reached to his pocket and pulled out a metal canister, unwound the lid and poured a yellowish white liquid into a small cap sitting on the table at his front. The old man returned the canister to his jacket pocket slowly, pulled a yellow cloth from the pockets of his pants, pulled the cloth to his bulbous nose blowing furiously then scrunched up the cloth and returned it to his pocket, wheezed several times before retching a sickly cough, reached for the cloth again before shaking his head, lowering both hands, gently pressing his two index fingers against each side of the cap, pressing firm, pulling the cap to his mouth, grinning chesherly and throwing the liquid down his throat; gasping for air as his throat flamed and the oxygen extinguished from his lungs. He threw himself forward as he threw the cap back on the table slapping his right leg with an open palm and stamping his left foot swimmingly on the floor.

  “Alright, me pipes are clean. Now, if it’s children ya want then it’s children ya get; for children, of dem, I have many. Now can I offer you gentlemen a story at all? I have in my tidings a grand one. I tink you might like it. Will serve you well it will” said The Old Drunk Bastard.

  “What have you heard?” asked The Behemoth.

  “Sure twere just whisperings in passing, what one man had said to anudder. Might be nutin, could be anyting. Who knows? Not I. But, tis wurt a listen it is. Excuse me a sec would ya? Seamus!! I told ya to clear those fuckin tinkers outta my house” screamed The Old Drunk Bastard jumping from his seat and waving his cane around stumbling over to where a group of four men lay on the floor passing an opium pipe and listening to the echoes of stories being told around the room. The old man kicked them all with his plastic shoe, stubbing his toe in the process and hopping about in pain.

  “Feckin gobshites. You don’t pay, you don’t play. Now, fuck off and don’t come back without a feckin child, and not this adolescent shite, a feckin baby. You bring me an infant and I’ll consider settlin your debt. But you even tink about fuckin me widout so much as a feckin cuddle, I’ll sell yer arses to those mean looking cunts over there” he said pointing to the five White Hearts standing behind Marcos, The Behemoth and The War General.

  The old man took the canister from his pocket and held it to his mouth, spluttering liquid all over his mangy beard as he drank heartedly.

  “Come ere. Come on. Over ere. Move yer gargantuan arses. Let’s take a wee look at da tings I got” said The Old Drunk Bastard waving his arm and calling over the three men to the far side of the room where guarding a tiny entrance protected by a rusted chain, there stood three towering triplets.

  “Dere brothers ya know. From da Baltics. Mad as feckin hell dey are, but fuckin loyal. Dey want notin more dan ta watch a door. Give em a door to watch, dey watch it. It’s fuckin grand. I like yours dough. I’m sucker for irony. Now, bow your heads here gentlemen. Not for religious reasons. We drink ta dem. It’s just a low roof is all” he said ushering the men past the giant triplets and into the store.

  The men entered and inside the room were several cribs, each nursing several young infants, some sleeping on their backs with their legs flush like a frog, others swinging their heads to the left and right trying to see past the old lady who whispered quietly into their waking ears.

  In the back of the room was a caged cell where inside slept four young children, maybe five or six years old, one could never really know in this age. They lay together on a mattress on the floor stretched across one another in laxed slumber.

  On the far end of the room was an iron door with a sliding panel. The door was bolted shut.

  “Business gentlemen. Take a seat. Now, I know what I ave for you. But what surprise ya got for me?” The Old Drunk Bastard asked rubbing his fingers insidiously through his thick beard.

  The Behemoth took from a pouch on his belt a piece of cloth which he opened on the table. The old man smiled.

  “Ok den, what can I do for you?” he said folding the cloth over and passing it to the old lady who was still whispering to the infant children in the cots.

  “We’ve had complaints. The last children…”

  “No returns gentlemen. You know da rules” interrupted The Old Drunk Bastard..

  “As I was saying. The last children, the naturals; they didn’t condition well and the toddlers, they’re not remembering the dream” said Marcos.

  “Are ya tellin it right? Ma here, she’s old as fuck, but all she’s ever done is tell stories. Look at er. It’s not what she says; it’s how she fuckin says it” exclaimed The Old Drunk Bastard.

  “Maybe it’s the dream. Maybe it’s not clear enough. Maybe it’s not written right for children” said Marcos.

  ‘Deres notin wrong wit da dream. It’s a damn good dream. Da best I’ve ever written. Da problem is your fuckin Teller. I told ya before. That fuckin ghoul of yers, he can’t tell an apple from a feckin orange” said The Old Drunk Bastard.

  “Well what do you suggest?” asked Marcos.

  “Well, what do you want me to do, sell ye me Ma? Ya here dat Ma?” said The Old Drunk Bastard.

  The old lady lifted her brow but didn’t break from her gentle whispering and the infants, turning their heads to and fro, settled into their skins and closed their tender eyes, resting their little minds. The old woman kept her whisper, sneaking into the sleep of the children and caressing the fragility of their souls with her venerable kindness.

  “Listen, deres notin wrong with the product I gave ya. Ya can beat a stick all day long but unless ya got ridem, ya won’t be making music. You my friend, you gotta find yer ridem and fast, before the comin storm sweeps ya off yer feet” he said.

  “What have you heard old man?” asked Marcos.

  “De sound of tunder clappin hysterically in de subconscious o men and somewhere inside dat cloud, de place of light and sound, singin to de eyes and ears of every man, sayin ‘come ere, be entertained; bring your ma, bring your son a well, we got TV and video games, we got sunshine and Wi-Fi; all the tingy-me-bobs and doov-i-lackys one could ever want, need and waste’. Oh, sure sounds terrific, da sound a tunder. Can you ere it? I’d get yer selves ta higher ground I would before da shite is washed from yer arses” said The Old Drunk Bastard.

  “What do you have behind the door?” Marcos asked pointing to the far end of the room.

  “Oh dat, dats nuthin” said The Old Drunk Bastard hurriedly.

  “Now what about poems, will ya be needin anymore. I’ve got new poems for marchin, I got a great one for bein alone, ya know, fendin off da fright. What is it, somethin like ‘when I am alone ta da ta da and return ta bein at day’ somethin like dat. Anyway, and I got some for yer lovin, some really great ones and I got some for focus, ya know stop dose nasty emotions distractin yer kids. Whatta ya tink?” asked The Old Drunk Bastard holding open a book to the three men.

  “We’ll take two infants and the four toddlers there in the cage” said The Behemoth cutting the two men off.

  “What did you mean when you said, fast?” asked Marcos, his eyes cutting through the drunken canter’s stare.

  “Aye? Oh dat. Twas nuthin. Just da ramblins of an old drunk” he said with worry under every word.

  “Let me wrap up your purchases. Did ya want ta pick out da child or any will do?” he continued.

  The Behemoth stood up and walked over and studied the infants lying in the cot. The old lady kept her whispering while The Behemoth tapped on the foreheads of two babies. The Old Drunk Bastard waved his hand and a servant in a corner shadow curtseyed when made present then organised the trade.

  “Will der be anyting more?” said The Old Drunk Bastard.