Apocalypsis 01 - Kahayatle

plate on the ground in front of me and stood up, adjusting my cape self-consciously.   “What I have to say is that your plan to stay as separate tribes is a mistake.”   I looked around at the faces staring up at me and I saw mostly open-minded expressions.   A couple of the bigger guys looked doubtful, but I expected that - big guys often thought themselves invincible.
    “We’ve come from north of here.   All the way down from there to here we saw canners … cannibals.   We got into altercations with two different groups of them, one in my house and one in an orange grove about a day’s ride north of here.”
    “They came into your house?” asked a girl.
    “Yes.   They’re doing that all over.”
    “We thought there was an unspoken rule that houses were off limits.”
    “It used to be that way, but not anymore.   All the empty houses have been raided until there’s nothing left to eat.   All the grocery stores are empty and so are the warehouses.   Most of the kids, at least in this state, don’t know how to grow or raise their own food.   So they’re going after the easiest prey.”
    “Other kids,” said Peter, standing up next to me.  
    I held his hand for support because he was shaking like a leaf on a tree, and I knew what he was going to tell them.  
    “I’m from Sanford.   I lived there up until about three weeks ago with my little sister, Lily.”   He paused a moment to let that fact sink in.  
    Naturally, everyone was wondering where Lily was.  
    “One day we were outside our house, and a gang of kids was walking down the street.   They came after us and we tried to escape, but Lily fell down and hurt herself.   She couldn’t run anymore.”
    The faces around us showed fear.   Some of them probably either thought they knew what was coming next in the story or they suspected it was pretty bad.
    Peter’s voice was quaking now.   “They caught us and took her away.   They left me behind and wouldn’t let me go with them.”
    “Where is she now?” asked someone.
    Peter’s voice cracked and became almost a screech.   “She’s dead!”   He dropped his face into his hands and sobbed.  
    I put my arm across his back and continued the story.   “I wasn’t there, but Peter told me the whole thing.   I’m going to tell you … not to shock you, but to make you see that this is serious.   More serious than you can imagine.” I looked around to make sure I had everyone’s attention.   No one was even eating anymore.  
    “After they caught his sister, he followed them at a distance so they wouldn’t see him.   He saw them take her to someone’s house, so he ran back home to get his gun; but by the time he got back, it was too late.   They had killed her … and they were dismembering her and cooking her body parts to eat her.”   My stomach rolled queasily.   I saw three girls and one guy get up from their seats and run into the woods.   The sounds of their retching echoed across the silent space.
    Then the only sound to be heard in the swamp was Peter’s sobbing.   Bodo came up and put his arms around him, patting him on the back, his own eyes wet with tears.   “I’m so, so sorry for you, Peter.   Dat’s a terrible thing … terrible.”   He cleared his throat a couple times and looked up at the ceiling of the hut, trying to manage his emotions.
    “So you see,” I continued, “we have a really big problem out there and we need to do whatever we can to plan for these … monsters who will eventually be coming this way.”
    “But you said they’re up north of here,” said one girl, weakly.   “Sorry, I don’t mean any disrespect, Peter.”
    He shook his head but said nothing, still hiding his face.
    “They’re spreading out.   Kids I used to know were ganging together, abandoning their houses.   You know that once these few maniacs who are leading these groups start letting people think cannibalism is okay, the idea that it’s not will start to fade for the weak.   And there are plenty of weak-minded people out there.”
    “She’s talking sense, people,” said Paci.   “Our own history shows the same kind of thing happening to our ancestors.”
    “No one ate our ancestors, idiot,” said Jeremy sarcastically.
    “No.   But they murdered them didn’t they?   In cold blood.   People do strange things, bad things, when they’re fighting for resources like land and food.   You may have been all busy with your