Armageddon's Children Read Online Free PDF Page A

damp. Climbing the sidewalks was slow and treacherous. Candle went down twice, and Bear once. Panther frowned at them and kept going, above such failings. He had worn his hiking boots for better traction. Panther always wore what was needed. He was always prepared.
    In another place and time, he might have been leader of the Ghosts. He was bigger and stronger than Hawk, and only two years younger. He was more daring, more willing to take on anything that threatened. But Hawk had the vision, and they all believed that without the vision, you were lost. Owl was wise, Candle blessed with infallible instincts, and Bear steady and strong. Panther was brave. Chalk was talented, Sparrow fierce, and Fixit inventive. All the Ghosts had something that Hawk didn’t, but Hawk had the one thing they all needed, so they followed him.
    Two streets up, they found the Cats waiting, ten strong, at the appointed meeting place at the intersection of University and Third. Their home was in one of the abandoned condo buildings somewhere on the north edge of the city, although Hawk was unsure which one. This was neutral territory, uninhabited by any of the other tribes, a gathering place for all wishing to do business. Trades were how they all lived, each bringing something to the bargaining that the others needed. The Cats had a source for apples and plums. Fresh food of any sort was rare, and the demand for all of it high. Where the Cats found such food was a mystery, although Owl said she thought they must have discovered a small rooftop garden with the apple and plum trees already in place and had simply taken advantage.
    Whatever the case, you needed fresh fruit to stay healthy. Owl had studied up on it and told them so. Much of what had once been the diet of their civilization was gone—nearly everything that had been grown on the farms. The compounds still grew their own food, but they were having only mixed success, given the soil and water they had to work with. Most of what the street kids ate was prepackaged and made edible by adding water and heating. There were certain canned foods you could still eat and bottled liquids you could drink, but these were fast disappearing. Stores of all kinds had long since been raided and cleaned out, and only a few useful ones remained, their locations carefully guarded secrets. The Ghosts had discovered one a couple of years back, and still carried out and stockpiled what they needed from time to time.
    What they had brought to trade at this meeting was as precious and as hard to come by as fresh food and was the sole reason the Cats might be willing to give up a portion of their own stash.
    “You’re late, Hawk,” called out Tiger, the Cats’ big, muscular leader.
    They weren’t, of course, but Hawk didn’t argue. This was just Tiger’s way of marking his territory. “Ready to deal?”
    Tiger was wearing his trademark orange-and-black-striped T-shirt beneath his slicker. All of the Cats wore some piece of clothing that was meant to suggest the kind of cat from which they had taken their names, although some of them were hard to decipher. One kid wore pants with vertical blue and red stripes. What was he supposed to be? Panther liked to make fun of them for working so hard at being something they clearly weren’t. Real cats were small and sleek and stealthy. The Cats were a jumble of sizes and shapes and might as well be called Elephants or Camels. He was a better cat than they were, he was fond of saying. They didn’t even have a “Panther” in their tribe. Besides, they had only started calling themselves Cats and taking cat names after they found out about the Ghosts.
    “Ain’t nothin’ but a bunch of copycats,” he would declare, sneering at the idea.
    Hawk met Tiger alone in the center of the intersection while the others on both sides stayed where they were. Trades were rituals, marked by protocol and tradition. The leaders met first, alone, talked through the details of the