Extract from a work in progress – love to get some feedback on this!

The pair trudged onward. They believed their legs would ache by now but it was their souls that ached first. The journey was long. Soon enough, they would meet their creator, Maidyn. Being all that was left of humanity, there was nothing for them to fix, to make, to go on for. So it was time to return. 

Hudson sniffed before he spoke, on each occasion. It was as if each sniff was a thought that he breathed in, machinating in his cells and expelling it vocally.

“Hey Judd, what do you suppose that Maidyn looks like?”

Judd responded in the same way as he had all the other times that he had been asked this question.

 “Well, I suppose Maidyn to be, extremely beautiful”

“Yes” Hudson agreed. “And what do you suppose Maidyn to be like, beneath the surface, as a being?”

Judd stopped walking for a second. He had not been expecting a follow up question

“Maidyn will be violently magnificent, and devastatingly kind”

Hudson beamed. Always in awe of Judd and his ability to use words to cause pause in his thought. He stooped to pick an item from the road debris. It turned out to be a poker chip

“I am willing to bet, that Maidyn is looking forward to seeing us again, do you remember the last time we met?”

“No” Judd replied. “And neither do you”

Something drove both of them to return to Maidyn, when the time was right. In truth, neither could remember Maidyn the person. It has been such a long time. They did not know why they must return, only that they must. They did not know what would happen when they got there. It was a single road. The only road left. So it must be the road that led to Maidyn. This was the logic that they stuck to.

When the light from the sun faded they would stop. They would find higher ground away from the road and look for fires across the landscape. It had been a long time since they had seen any. Many months now. The instruction had been to return to Maidyn. Perhaps everyone else was already there. Perhaps they were the only ones still travelling.

“It was a good day today wasn’t it Judd? We found the chip, we determined that Maidyn would be magnificently violent and kind of devastating”

“That is not what I said” Judd replied. “Its time to snooze Hudson”

“I’m glad you are here Judd. Will we find Maidyn tomorrow?”

“I think it will take longer than that Hudson. We shall see”

The two figures huddled on the floor under the open sky. Above and below them stars died, planets went cold. Somewhere, beyond the horizon, Maidyn was waiting. They were convinced of it. Before sleep, Judd thought about Kimmy, the last other person they had seen alive. Kimmy was smart and brave and good at telling jokes. Kimmy decided it was better to sit and wait for Maidyn to find her instead. Judd had stopped talking about Kimmy, so he decided it was best if he did too. But he drifted to sleep each night with an image of Kimmy, knees huddled up to her chest as the dust swirled and the wind blew. She told a joke but it was too noisy to hear

“Knock knock” Kimmy said

“Who is there?” Judd had shouted back

There was no reply.

The earth cracked and creaked as the sun rose weakly in the sky. Hudson and Judd brushed the dust and sand from their bodies and continued on their journey. Soon the road ahead wobbled in the heat. Hudson held the poker chip tightly in his hand. Maidyn was waiting for them. Judd had been determined to arrive with a gift, even though they had limited possessions. “I will find a gift along the way, a memory from our journey” He had told Judd. Each time a new item was discovered he would carry it in his hand so that he could give it to Maidyn as soon as they met. When a new or better potential gift became available the old gift would go into the satchel and the new gift would be in his hand.

When they paused for a break, he would set out each of the items from the satchel on a handkerchief on the road. So far they included a door knocker, a dolls head, a thimble and a set of plastic measuring spoons. The poker chip was the best so far. The other items he thought he might keep to himself as a memory of the journey. He was ever hopeful that a better gift would present itself soon.

Occasionally there would be vehicles on the road, mainly they were broken and mangled. Some, it was hard to tell if they were vehicles or not. If there were any that looked promising Judd would clamber inside, search for keys. If the keys were there he would try to make the car work. Hudson remembered many months ago that a car had actually started. Then Judd remembered that he did not know how to drive. Yet still he would clamber into the vehicle in the hope that one would work. Something he had seen in films once, when there were films to see. It was just a flicker of hope, mostly they just played the game. The only hope was Maidyn. It would take as long as it took to get there.

Then there was Speck. They called him that because he was so far away. Moving on the horizon. At first they were excited to think that it might be Maidyn. But Maidyn would not keep getting further away, Maidyn would run to them, joyful, embracing. Speck was cold and distant on the horizon, sometimes there sometimes not. A trudging figure. Speck slept when they slept, he walked when they walked. Once, they thought they may be only a few hours behind him. They could almost make out a hat, a long trench coat and some kind of stick that he carried over his shoulder. Speck walked quickly so it was not the kind of stick that you would use for walking. 

Hudson had asked “Do you think Speck would be kind and magnificent? Would Speck want to be our friend?”

Judd pondered this for a day or so. “I think, he said eventually, that if Speck wanted to be our friend he would have stopped and waited for us by now”

“Perhaps he has not seen us yet. Perhaps we are both specks to him also?”

Judd smiled and put his hand on Hudson’s shoulder.

“How often do I check behind us?” Judd asked

“Every 30 minutes, on the dot” Hudson replied, pleased to have remembered this detail.

“Don’t you think Speck would have done the same by now, even just once?”

Hudson stayed silent. He twirled the poker chip in his fingers as they walked. “It would have been nice to have someone else to talk to” he said. Judd nodded. It began to rain and Speck disappeared off the road, taking shelter in the trees the same as they did. Maybe there were still things to hope for, gamble on. Judd wrapped his arms around himself and shivered to sleep.