In the latter days of the twenty-first century, two deadly wars devastated the planet. The first was the war between the West and the Muslim world. Nuclear devastation nearly destroyed the planet at the end of the conflict. The survivors of this conflict discovered that they have a new enemy. My kind. The genetically altered, not-quite-human entities known as the Mutants. Thus the second war began, and it's still ongoing. We're in it for the species, folks.
No one knows for sure where we Mutants come from. Some say that we are the result of a U.S. government experiment. Others claim we're simply products of natural evolution. One thing for sure, since we're twenty five percent of the world's population at last count, clashes between us and the Humans are inevitable. FYI? We're nothing like the X-Men or Avengers you might have seen in movies or television shows, folks.
My full name is Khaled Adewale but I go by Khal, which is short for Khaled. Anyone looking at me would see a six-foot-three, lean and athletic male of African descent. That's all you'll see, until you look into my eyes. I have vaguely luminescent yellow eyes. I was born in what was once known as metropolitan Detroit, Michigan. The remnants of this once-great metropolis are little more than ruins, lorded over by my brother/enemy, Yassin Adewale the Slayer.
Once, Yassin and I ruled the remnants of Detroit together. When we were younger, we lived in a Horde, as groups of Mutant families are called. Our Horde was destroyed by marauding Humans, and when Yassin and I grew to manhood, we hunted down and killed every man and woman belong to the marauding band that killed our family. We rallied fellow Mutants and organized them into a fighting force known as the Red Warriors. Together, we seized Detroit, and it became a paradise for our kind.
A city full of Humans but ruled by a sizeable number of Mutants. Yassin and I were a force to reckon with. Until he cast me out and seized power. The city has about a hundred thousand inhabitants, which makes it one of the largest settlements in today's world. I miss my home, but I'm forced to make my way into the desert wastelands that make up the bulk of the United States of America. I cannot return to Detroit under penalty of death. Brother love, ladies and gentlemen. Nothing quite like it in this cosmos.
"Are you finally going to stop frigging staring at me?" A sharp feminine voice snatched me out of my reverie, and I looked at my companion, Nadia. The short, slender, brown-eyed and bronze-skinned young woman scowls at me. I sigh deeply before replying to my favorite little hothead. Patience is a virtue, I remind myself.
"Nadia, I wasn't staring at your skinny ass, I was just reflecting," I reply, and Nadia rolls her eyes. I ignore her and look past her, at the vast landscape that was once known as Southern California. We're a long way from Detroit, that's for damn sure. I don't like it out in the desert. Too much radiation, even for a Mutant like myself.
"Whatever you say," Nadia mutters under her breath, and she grabs her equipment and ducks under a rocky outcropping. Sometimes I wonder how Humans survived to become the dominant species on this planet, seriously. Humans lack natural weapons, and they're petty and vindictive, prone to infighting due to their nasty habit of focusing on their differences rather than what they have in common. Even before my kind came along, this breed was doomed.
Now, considering the hostilities between Humans and Mutants, and my own personal history, you might wonder why I'm traveling with someone like Nadia Ibrahim. Look, I'll try to simplify this long story as best I can. After my brother Yassin Adewale and I had our little conflict, he kept me imprisoned in his own personal Gulag.
I was stuck in a cage next to Nadia Ibrahim and her brother Yousef. My brother Yassin was debating whether or not to execute me instead of banishing me. I was trapped, and desperate situations make strange bedfellows. That's when I met Nadia and Yousef. They're a couple of troublemakers from the Outlands, as we modern-day North Americans call the Middle East. That area of the world was bombarded at the end of the war between the West and the Muslims.
I helped Nadia and Yousef escape, and both Yousef and I were grievously wounded during our fight with the Red Warriors, but we managed to get out of Detroit. Yousef died from his injuries, while my more-than-human system slowly healed from the fatal wounds I sustained. Prior to dying, Yousef tasked me with protecting his sister. Don't ask me why but I felt compelled to keep my promise to the Human. Sometimes, though, I almost want to reconsider.
"We won't get far in this heat, Khaled, might as well bunk down until the evening," Nadia says, and I reluctantly agree. In the old days, Southern California was one of the hottest places on the planet. Thanks to nuclear fallout, and the effects of global warfare on the North American climate, it is now hotter than hell. As a Mutant, I possess above-average levels of physical strength, speed and endurance but I am not invincible.
"We'll hunker down till night fall, then we got to move, I want to reach the beach by dawn," I say grimly, and Nadia slowly nods. I join her under the rocky outcropping, and we hunker down, side by side. I take my gourd and slake my thirst, taking down four gulps before I stop myself. Can't drink it all now. Got to save some for later. Water is exceptionally hard to find in the desert, even for me.
