Arena Three

The closer we get, the better my view becomes, and it dawns on me that we’re approaching a series of massive craters that have completely obliterated the road.

We drive up to the precipice and stop. One by one, we dismount from our bikes and stand side by side in a row staring at the chasm before us, the latest hurdle blocking our way.

“It looks like the Grand Canyon,” Bree says.

I don’t know how she can find beauty in it at all. To me, it looks like a scar in the earth. A war-inflicted wound. A gash that will never heal, violently blighting the world.

I can’t help the disappointment that bites at me. We’re less than two hours from Houston and now we’re facing another massive detour that might add who knows how many hours onto our journey. We’re so low on gas, I don’t even know if our bikes can handle going off course again. The last thing we need is to be stranded and have to proceed on foot. It would be a cruel trick for fate to play on us when we’re so close to the Texas border.

“What are we going to do?” Molly says. “We can’t go around it. It looks like it stretches on for miles.”

She’s right. The crater goes on and on, as far as the eye can see.

“We’ll have to find a way down,” I say.

“You want to drive through it?” Ryan questions me, an eyebrow raised.

“What about the radiation?” Ben adds. “It will be worse down there. We can’t risk exposure.”

As much as it frustrated me when the two were arguing, having them team up against me is even more annoying.

“Do either of you have a better plan? You know how to make a bridge?” I say sarcastically in response. When I’m met by a wall of silence, I add, “Didn’t think so.”

And with that, we get back on the bikes and begin driving slowly along the edge, looking for a place we might be able to drive down. But this crater isn’t home to a slaver community. No one’s chiseled a path for bikes into the crater’s edge. It’s just a sharp, jagged hole, blasted into the earth by a nuclear bomb.

“If we had some rope, we could try shooting it across with an arrow,” Molly says.

“I’m pretty sure that only works in cartoons,” I say. “Plus, there’s the whole not having any rope situation.”

“What if we abandon the bikes?” Bree says from behind me. “Maybe we’d be able to scramble down?”

It’s one of the more sensible suggestions, but it’s still too risky. Not having the bikes could mean the difference between life and death. We need to keep hold of them as long as we possibly can.

“Hey, look!” Charlie suddenly cries, pointing ahead.

We ride over to where he was pointing and see animal tracks leading down into crater. If we follow in their footsteps, we’re bound to find a safe way down. It looks like a pack of them walk this route regularly, at least enough to have worn a wide groove into the mountainside. But I look at the others, unsure.

“They might be predators,” I say.

Molly raises a cocksure eyebrow. “Last time I checked, we were the predators,” she says.

I can’t help but smile at her fighting spirit. She’s right. Whatever animals made those tracks, we’re stronger, better, and fiercer than them.

“Okay,” I say. “Let’s do this.”

I lead the way down the perilous path. We don’t use the motors, instead letting gravity do the work. Any way we can save gas now we’ll have to take. Plus, if we’re quiet enough, we won’t draw attention to ourselves to whatever predators are lurking in the bottom of the crater.

Bree holds onto me tightly, tense as I maneuver down the steep incline. Bits of rock tumble from beneath my tires, making my heart fly into my mouth. She’s gripping so hard it’s starting to irritate the wounds on my chest and back.

After a tense ten minutes, we finally make it into the crater. As soon as I get on level land, an eerie feeling comes over me. My spine tingles as I get that undeniable sensation that we’re being watched.

We race across the trough of the crater then reach the steep wall at the other side. There’s no sign of a path back up. I curse under my breath.

“We need to search on foot,” I say. “There’s not enough gas to keep riding back and forth.”

As I start scanning the crater’s edge, it occurs to me that the only way we’re getting the bikes back up is by pushing. Even if we do find a path we can follow, it’s going to be back-breaking work getting back out of here.

“I think I’ve found something!” Molly calls.

We all go over and see her peering into a hole, five feet in diameter, dug into the side of the crater. It’s clearly been made by an animal of some sort.

“Do you think it’s a burrow?” I ask.

“I guess so,” Molly says. “Pretty big burrow.”

I don’t want to even imagine the type of creature that’s living inside. At the basin of the crater, the radiation will be high, meaning whatever lives down here will have taken a huge dose over the years. Just like the crazies in the lakes in the north, the creatures living down here will have evolved into something unrecognizable and formidable.