"Dad, what lies outside the Kingdom?" asked a sixteen year old boy.
"No one knows, Kael." Said a voice behind him. "After all, it's been almost five hundred years since anyone has gone outside."
The sixteen year old Kael Thorne tilted his head upwards and squinted. Past the vast hills of trash that blanketed what was once ground, past the area where the trash ends and where the rows of dark, dingy homes start, past the vast blue sky, past the clouds that blanketed the sky, he looked further, further beyond. Even then, he could only just about make out the faintest outline of the grey dome that covered the kingdom. He sighed. 'It's not like I'll be able to see what's beyond.' No, not in this lifetime. For all that concerned Kael, it was the edge of the world.
And perhaps it was better if it remained that way. It was common knowledge that the dome protected Arkhaven kingdom from the dangers that lay beyond, deemed absolutely necessary after "the incident" 500 years ago. It was said that "the incident" was the single greatest disaster that had ever occurred in the history of the world, earning its title by causing the most devastating period of lost life ever recorded. Even just the aftermath of "the incident" had shook the planet to its core, triggering a slow, powerful erosion that ate away at the world.
Yes, the more he recalled, the more he realised that the barrier was absolutely necessary. He shivered at the mere thought of being exposed to the outside world. Certainly, nothing good can ever be gained from facing the planet-destroying erosion that came from "the incident". At least the barrier that covered Arkhaven offered a form of resistance to the decrepit world beyond, giving humanity the chance to recuperate and wait out for the effects of the aftermath to die out.
"Boy, stop daydreaming and help me out with this."
Pulled back to reality, Kael turned around. A good distance behind, the robust figure of his father was hunched over, both hands clasped around a metallic grey pipe that was wedged in the ground. How was it wedged in the ground, you might ask? Well…
Kael scanned the area with a complicated expression. From miles and miles on end, the only thing that could be seen was garbage that piled up high into hills, sometimes mountains.
The Heap. That's what the people called the place. This place was the inner city's junkyard.
Only the lowest of the low lived here. Unable to find their place in the inner city, they flocked here for survival, building small, shabby living spaces that enshrined the mound of garbage. After all, the endless mountains of trash was their treasure, a hotspot where the poor could earn a living. The presence of The Heap as the center of economic activity rightfully earned this outer city the name of Garbage city.
And Kael and his father were such residents of Garbage city, currently carrying out their weekly excursion at The Heap.
"Kael, for god's sake, come help me with this!" His father yelled, except it was more like a strained grumble, a shout suppressed from all the strength he tried to exert to dislodge and acquire the metal pipe.
"Coming." he dragged the word out and started walking towards his father. However, he was suddenly distracted as the outline of a plastic bag protruding out of the ground caught his eyes. On a habitual instinct, he bent down and snatched it up, revealing a half-eaten bagel inside the bag. "It's decent." He shrugged and tossed it in the sack that was slung over his shoulders.
He quickly strode over to his father and placed both his hands over the pipe, similar to his father. "On the count of three, pull with all your might, ya hear me?" "Kay." "Okay, in 1, 2, …." Kael tightened his grip on the pipe as his father counted. "3!" He anchored his feet onto the ground, and pulled with all his might. The pipe refused to come loose without a fight, but even then, the pipe was slowly but surely coming out.
"Pop!"
Kael suddenly found himself sprawled up on the ground.
"!!!" he hurriedly clenched his nose as the unpleasant smell of 500-year old rust and decomposed food matter wafted into his nose. Hurriedly, he stood up, where the air was much fresher, and looked at his father.
Triumphantly grasping the pipe in his hand, his father inspected it with a wondrous glint in his eyes, before throwing his head back and cackling. "Hahaha, would you look at that?" He lowered his head and faced Kael. With his other hand, he pointed at the pipe and grinned. "I just found the perfect component for my gun. Just look at it, it hardly has any rust! And it's the perfect thickness as well!" His voice commanded the attention of everyone around him, not that there was usually anyone near them. The sixty year old man had a head of greyish - white hair that extended down to his face into a respectable short beard. He wore a thin grey coat that hid another brown shirt from within, and had long, thick pants and boots that were necessary for their line of "work" to protect his legs. This was the same fit that Kael was currently wearing as well, except Kael's pants had pockets, a feature that his father had insisted on adding. "It would make life a lot more convenient", he had said, despite not having any himself.
'Father's acting like a child.' Kael looked at him with deadpanned eyes. "Okay dad." With a small grin that betrayed his disinterested voice, he turned around again and continued scanning the ground for any more food scraps while his father stuffed the pipe into his own sack.
The government only provided minimal provisions to Garbage city. A chunk of flavourless stale bread that stuck to the throat washed down with the 250ml bottle of water that came with it were the only items that were distributed to those that came down to their distribution facility.
Because of this, the duo frequently made trips to the Heap every week. Kael was put in charge of collecting food scraps to make their meals more interesting, while his father collected scrap metal that were used to craft tools in his workshop. On rare occasions, these scrap metal could also be submitted to the distribution facility in exchange for credit points, which were used to buy clothes and pay rent. However, his father disliked doing this, grumbling about it being "A waste of good material."
"Wait, Kael, it's about time, we will start heading back. It's getting late, and we want to return before the vultures arrive." Heaving his sack back onto his shoulders, Kael's father reminded Kael.
Vultures was a term used to describe scavengers that fed off of other scavengers. They would appear in the early evening at the borders of The Heap, robbing people of their scavenged treasures, and people like Kael and his father were their prime targets. They were quite a nasty bunch, but alas, that's how the world works. People have to live somehow.
Kael glanced at his wrist, where a wrist watch sat, a small contraption that Kael's father had given him as a birthday present. His father acquired it by fixing up a broken watch they found in the Heap.
On the watch sat the current time. 'It's currently 5 pm. That leaves about 2 hours to make the hike down. However, we need to travel carefully, as one wrong step could awaken an avalanche. Considering the nature of the journey, we can make it with half an hour to spare.'
"Kay." He shrugged and prepared to head back.
Following his father, they mindfully trudged together in the trash heaps, slowly but surely heading closer to civilization. On this day, they had travelled further than usual, though not so far that it was abnormal, such that they could see the northern city buildings and catch a glimpse of the dome, but they actually lived in the southern area. Thus they were actually walking in the opposite direction to the city they saw.
Every step shifted the trash, and as hundreds of years old scrap metal, glass and plastic collided with each other, threatening creaking sounds were sent into their ears. Nevertheless, the duo didn't feel intimidated in the slightest. They had made enough trips there to learn how to skillfully navigate the uneven surface.
The evening sun hung in the sky, bathing the desolate landscape in a golden hue. His father, who was in front of him, turned his head back at Kael and remarked: "The weather is pretty nice today." Kael couldn't help but agree. The shimmering sea of trash did look quite stunning, and the warmth of the sun comforted him, something that was hard to come by.
The journey was calm and peaceful, a good contract compared to the dreary and depressing atmosphere of Garbage City.
But thats when day's peculiarities started.