The people of Wall Town - despite being the frontier between what survived to form a new civilisation and what was trapped outside - were nothing like the thriving populace inside. It would be more accurate to say that they were a potent mixture of feral, furious and faster than anything looking so human had the right to be. Still, they stopped everyone outside from coming in and they did it too well for anybody inside to complain.
The people of Wall Town knew their lot in the new life, knew that if they continued to photograph the corpses of whatever strayed too close or filmed the killings they would be left alone by the inner dwellers. They were rarely visited by anyone from inside to the extent that their environmental exposure and altered appearance made the two groups seem more like two utterly separate species.
With their thicker skin all wrinkled and leathery like a tortoise, their tougher nails kept filed to lethal points and a digestive system that could put a vulture's to shame, they were truly made for their environment in the cramped cells along the outer walls of the alleged last remnants of civilisation.
In contrast the inner dwellers were made for foraging, not fighting, with their keener and bulbous eyes, their broad shovel-hands and flat herbivore teeth. They kept plants, whatever not-them-creatures would feed on those plants and ate both as often as possible. Of course they considered this to be the defining point that made them a more civil people than the wall dwellers who didn't farm or forage, they fought and fed on anything. It was barbaric to the surprisingly delicate sensibilities of the inner dwellers.
In spite of the disputes and annoyed attitudes of both wall and inner dwellers, both were glad to not be near the gate that acted as a meeting place, trading centre and weak point for their precious civilisation. The gates themselves had only ever opened once to allow for elephants to be brought inside, though in opening it crushed the majority of the dwellers who had crafted flimsy fabric homes around and inside the enormous hinges.
Their blood stains never faded and their dwellings were never replaced. That was the thing about the gate dwellers, they held a fearsome reverence of all life, being the ones who dealt with the wider variety of it on a regular basis. Nobody was turned down to trade and precious little was refused. there was always something to be made of a given item and they were a crafty people whose vocal chords extended deep down into their chest to allow them to bellow their offers for miles around, their arms thrice the length of their body with multiple joints to keep their wares away from thieving hands.
The last point of civilisation endured, though humanity was long gone.
The people of Wall Town knew their lot in the new life, knew that if they continued to photograph the corpses of whatever strayed too close or filmed the killings they would be left alone by the inner dwellers. They were rarely visited by anyone from inside to the extent that their environmental exposure and altered appearance made the two groups seem more like two utterly separate species.
With their thicker skin all wrinkled and leathery like a tortoise, their tougher nails kept filed to lethal points and a digestive system that could put a vulture's to shame, they were truly made for their environment in the cramped cells along the outer walls of the alleged last remnants of civilisation.
In contrast the inner dwellers were made for foraging, not fighting, with their keener and bulbous eyes, their broad shovel-hands and flat herbivore teeth. They kept plants, whatever not-them-creatures would feed on those plants and ate both as often as possible. Of course they considered this to be the defining point that made them a more civil people than the wall dwellers who didn't farm or forage, they fought and fed on anything. It was barbaric to the surprisingly delicate sensibilities of the inner dwellers.
In spite of the disputes and annoyed attitudes of both wall and inner dwellers, both were glad to not be near the gate that acted as a meeting place, trading centre and weak point for their precious civilisation. The gates themselves had only ever opened once to allow for elephants to be brought inside, though in opening it crushed the majority of the dwellers who had crafted flimsy fabric homes around and inside the enormous hinges.
Their blood stains never faded and their dwellings were never replaced. That was the thing about the gate dwellers, they held a fearsome reverence of all life, being the ones who dealt with the wider variety of it on a regular basis. Nobody was turned down to trade and precious little was refused. there was always something to be made of a given item and they were a crafty people whose vocal chords extended deep down into their chest to allow them to bellow their offers for miles around, their arms thrice the length of their body with multiple joints to keep their wares away from thieving hands.
The last point of civilisation endured, though humanity was long gone.
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