“So?” asked Xan.
“So!?” Cheyenne grabbed the boy by the shoulders, shaking him. “That means there are other people! We’re not the last ones.” The eleven-year-old teared up, trembling faintly while clutching her stomach.
“Why are you freaking out?” asked Ariana.
“Because… we’re the only kids. Only five of us.” Cheyenne sniffed, wiping a tear. “I thought people were gonna die off like everything else. Now I don’t gotta have a baby as soon as I’m sixteen!”
Sienna hugged her.
“What if they don’t like us?” asked Xan.
Raven resumed walking, waving for the others to follow. “I think the chances of another person being dangerous are probably low. It depends on if he’s a crazy lone survivor or there’s a larger group. The more people there are, the better the chances they’ll be friendly.”
“We should stay quiet,” whispered Josh. “If we make a lot of noise, the guy might find us.”
Ariana and Cheyenne gasped, clinging to each other.
“If he’s nice, finding us isn’t bad,” said Tinsley.
They walked in relative silence until the daylight faded too much to see beyond about fifty feet. Raven announced they’d stop to sleep here for the night. After a meal of muffins and bottled water, they reclined on the ground to watch the sky darken, revealing stars. The kids oohed and gasped, utterly captivated at the sight. Sienna went back into teacher mode, explaining about space, other planets, and constellations.
“We forgot our night clothes,” said Cheyenne.
“Don’t need them out here. It’s really warm.” Josh yawned. “Take your poncho off and use it like a blanket.”
Raven used the lumpy tool satchel for a pillow, stretching out with Tinsley tucked against her side. The Arc might be a death trap, but she did miss her bed.
“Should we keep watch?” asked Xan.
Josh sat up. “What’s that mean?”
“Means someone stays awake to look out for bad guys. Read it in a book about soldiers.”
Ariana yawned. “What’s soldiers?”
“People who fight bad guys and protect good guys.” Xan reclined, lacing his fingers behind his head.
“Bad guys like Plutions?” asked Tinsley.
“Do you think they’re still around here?” Cheyenne shifted, trying to get comfortable on the ground.
Raven smiled. “I might have told you something wrong. Spoke to the doc earlier…” She explained how what the stories described as toxic aliens most likely came from a misunderstanding of pollution, bad chemicals and such in places they didn’t belong.
Aliens wouldn’t be a threat, but someone had been in this area fairly recently with boots. They, too, might not be dangerous, but the wild man or his tribe could be. The idea of keeping a watch sounded like a good one. The two youngest kids likely lacked the discipline or attention span to adequately perform lookout duty. She settled on asking Josh to take first shift, then wake her up, and she’d wake Sienna for the last bit.
Much to Raven’s surprise, she didn’t end up staring at the stars, worrying for hours. Sleep took her right away.
A face full of sunlight pulled Raven out of a dreamless sleep.
She yawned and sat up. Everyone else lay sprawled about unconscious, Josh with his mouth hanging open.
Guess he fell asleep on watch.
Sitting there alone at night would have definitely been boring. No surprise a twelve-year-old passed out. Without a more concrete threat than a whole bunch of maybes, Raven guessed she, too, would have failed to stay up. They also didn’t have any way to measure two hours aside from counting seconds… and repetitive counting would definitely knock her out.
Raven wandered away from the camp to relieve herself. When she returned and rummaged a muffin from her satchel, the soft clatter of tools woke Tinsley, who sat up with one eye open and looked around making such a ‘where am I?’ expression, Raven burst out laughing. Sienna woke, as did the other girls.
Josh groaned and rolled onto his front. “Ngh, turn the light off.”
“That’s the sun,” said Sienna. “We can’t turn it off.”
Xan remained asleep until Cheyenne shook him.
While gnawing on muffins, the kids talked about how topside wasn’t as scary as they thought before. Sienna confided in Raven that she’d become worried Noah would be furious at her for bringing the kids outside without authorization, and they’d take them away, reassigning them to live with their bio parents. Well, except for Josh whose parents had died.
“He won’t.” Raven nudged her. “You are their mother. You’ve raised them all since infancy.”
“You helped. And I didn’t get Josh full time until he was six. You really don’t think Noah will blow up?”
Raven finished chewing a hunk of muffin. “Nope. It’s me who should be anxious.”
“How do you figure that?”
She sighed, lowering her voice to keep the kids from hearing. “Chase didn’t want to get attached to Tins because he expected she wouldn’t live long. I’m worried if we get around this issue of the Arc falling apart, he might try to take her or like try to become part of her life. She doesn’t even know who he is.”
“Selfish bastard. He’s more worried about being sad than his kid dying. Forget him. You got a big sword now. He tries anything, slice him in the”—she wagged her eyebrows—“wiener.”
Raven collapsed against her, laughing so hard she nearly choked on muffin crumbs.
The kids looked over at them.
“What’s funny?” called Xan.
“Boring old person joke.” Sienna whacked Raven on the back. “Stop choking.”
“I’m glad we don’t gotta wear the masks,” said Ariana.
Xan lifted his from his chest, making a sour face. “Yeah. It smells like my inside pants.”
“Nothing smells that bad,” said Cheyenne.
He regarded her with an unimpressed glance. “You’ve smelled my inside pants?”
Tinsley and Ariana giggled.
Cheyenne blushed. “No!”
“Then how can you say they smell worse than anything?”
“It’s just a saying!” Cheyenne flailed her arms. “Butthead.”
Raven finished her muffin, stood, and pulled the satchel strap over her shoulder. “C’mon. People are running out of air. We should get moving.”
The kids scrambled to finish eating and throw their ponchos back on. Tinsley appeared to consider going barefoot like the others for a moment, but decided to wear her sandals. Raven checked the compass, got her bearings, and set off toward the ruins.
Yesterday’s complete cloud cover had broken up into long separate strands, as though an enormous clawed creature shredded a cotton blanket. Even under the tree canopy, the day had already become warm, and would likely heat up even more. They walked until the sun appeared to be right overhead and the heat grew burdensome. Raven announced a quick rest break for lunch, guiding everyone to an area of thicker trees.
They sat in the shady spot having a lunch of not-quite-stale bread. The kids removed their ponchos to cool off. The boys wore baggy shorts similar to Raven’s long pants, with extra pockets on the legs, garments that would likely fit them for another year or two unless they grew abnormally fast. Tinsley would outgrow her skirt relatively soon if the old thing didn’t fall apart first. Cheyenne wore a relatively new pair of cotton-plus pants, the same green-brown color as the ponchos. From the look of it, she’d probably only been the fourth child to inherit them. The hem stopped a fair ways above her ankles. Considering how slender she was, those pants had likely been intended for a younger kid than eleven. Ariana wore a sleeveless dress made from an adult inside shirt, a rare article of child-sized clothing.
Everyone sweating so much made Raven worry about their water supply. If the heat kept up, they’d definitely end up having to drink water from that stream. Risking it maybe being polluted or having microorganisms beat dying of dehydration, but not by much. Perhap
s she could find a way to build a fire and boil the water first just to be sure. All the ruined houses provided ample wood that wouldn’t require an axe she didn’t have to chop down a tree she didn’t want to destroy; igniting it would be the challenging part.
During a pause in the kids’ conversation about the icky heat, a distinct thump-thump came from the woods not far from where they’d paused to rest. Everyone froze still. Raven twisted to her left, reaching for the katana handle above her right shoulder while eyeing the foliage in the direction the rustle came from.
A minute or two passed without anyone making the slightest sound or motion.
Expecting the wild man to have returned with others, Raven listened for people trying to sneak up and surround them.
“Did you hear that?” whispered Cheyenne.
Leaves moved in the same spot from which the thumping arose.
Cheyenne clapped both hands over her mouth.
Crunch.
Raven eased the katana a few inches out of the scabbard, trying to draw it without making noise.
The leaves moved again. Something of substantial weight moved closer.
Ariana emitted a faint gasp of alarm.
A brown furry face popped out of the foliage. Ears stuck out to either side of an elongated—and clearly not human—head, a black nose at the tip. Large black eyes widened as the critter also froze.
Raven let go of the sword. Years ago as a kid in school, she’d looked at pictures of a similar creature, but the shock of seeing a living animal of that size caused her to draw a blank on its name. She couldn’t remember much about it other than a vague notion it wouldn’t try to eat them.
“Is that a deer?” whispered Xan.
The creature’s left ear twitched.
“Dunno.” Josh scrunched his nose. “Don’t they have big horns?”
“It’s a girl deer,” said Tinsley.
Two other deer, each less than half the size of the first, lifted their heads into view out of the greenery. At the sight of baby deer, all three girls plus Josh squeaked in ‘aww.’
The deer bolted, racing away into the trees. They vanished in mere seconds, though the thumping of their hooves remained audible for a moment longer.
All fear gone, the kids erupted in cheers, chattering about seeing a real, living deer. They swarmed Sienna, practically demanding she refresh them on that lesson. Evidently, they’d done a few hours’ learning about extinct animals two weeks ago.
When Sienna mentioned that some people before the Great Death hunted those animals for sport, all the kids gasped in horror. Sienna explained that other people killed them for food. That stunned the kids and led into her telling them about meat. All of them, including Sienna and Raven, had only ever consumed vegetables, beans, and mushrooms grown in the hydroponic facility.
“… it’s been many decades, but the original occupants of the Arc bred live animals for food and other things like milk,” said Sienna, to shocked gasps.
“Whoa.” Raven stared at her. “They never taught us that.”
“You know that thing I mentioned the other day about margin notes saying don’t share that information? Yeah…” She frowned into her lap. “Maybe I shouldn’t have listened to it. The animal pens are on level one. That’s probably why they don’t let anyone up there.”
Raven put a hand on her friend’s arm. “No… well, unless Noah lied to me.”
“What?” She blinked.
“He said the original infirmary is up there. Big and fancy like hospitals used to be before the Great Death. A machine broke and released radioactive cesium. People aren’t allowed up there because it will make us sick and kill us.”
The kids all gasped again, staring at her.
“If level one also had animal pens, they probably died when the cesium leaked.” Raven cringed.
“Aww…” Josh looked down.
“Wouldn’t a whole bunch of dead animals smell really bad?” Cheyenne tilted her head. “Even if it was like a long time ago, we’d smell it, right?”
“The whole Arc smells like butt.” Xan smirked. “The stuff in the hydroponic farm is basically liquid poop.”
“And sewer lines leak all the time,” muttered Raven. “Oh… wait a minute. I just got an idea.”
“Do tell.” Sienna ate the last piece of her bread.
Raven shared the theory that Lark came up with about the Arc’s population going from several thousand to only a few hundred in a short amount of time. “I always thought it was something horrible, like a bad disease killing a lot of people rapidly. How else could we have lost all the doctors, scientists, and really smart people? If there’d been a gradual loss of population, people would have been trained, right?”
“Yeah, that makes sense.” Sienna nodded.
“What if they left like Lark thinks, and when they left, they took the animals with them?” Raven gestured at the spot where the deer had been. “Some escaped?”
“I don’t think we’d have farmed deer… more like sheep, goats, and chickens. Kinda difficult to raise cows underground. They’re a little big.”
“What’s a cow?” asked Tinsley.
Raven stood. “Let’s get going again. She can tell us about cows while we walk.”
Xan offered to take the backpack for the remainder of the day to give Josh a break. The kids put their ponchos on and formed into a single file line with Raven up front, Sienna at the back, and Tinsley right behind her mother. Barefoot hiking didn’t appear to bother the children anywhere near as much as Sienna, who kept finding painful things to step on.
They walked at a steady pace, as fast as possible to go with a six-year-old along. Raven could have made better time alone, but the peace of mind she gained by not worrying if she’d return to find her child asphyxiated more than balanced out the slowdown. Sienna reprised her role as teacher, relaying as much information as she could recall from memory about cows. Admittedly, the description came out basic, but she promised to go over them in more detail once she had her textbooks again. She moved on to teaching the kids about the various plants, trees, and doing her best to explain the purpose of any random artifact from the past society they encountered.
Other than in schoolbooks, Sienna had never seen any of the foliage in person before either. The fascination and wonder in her voice made the woman sound more like a kid herself.
Around early evening, the forest broke up into clumps separated by swaths of grassy areas surrounding the remains of houses. A few traces of paved road appeared here and there, mostly as loose chunks of blacktop jutting up from the dirt. The majority of the houses had long since collapsed into piles of moldy wood and aluminum siding. With night under an hour away, Raven allowed herself to veer off course in search of a better place to sleep than out in the open. Hints of street signs and mailboxes revealed the layout of a former suburban neighborhood engulfed by unchecked nature. Perhaps this land had been woods long ago before humanity forced its way in.
In one cul-de-sac, they found a house that hadn’t fallen in on itself. Long boards and/or pipes braced the walls from the outside, likely chunks of debris scavenged from nearby ruins. Tarps of various colors formed a patchwork over the roof and an overgrown garden wrapped around the left side of the house into the area behind it.
Raven had been down to the hydroponic farm often enough to recognize the majority of the growth as food-bearing plants, though from her current distance, couldn’t recognize the exact type. Whoever planted it had clearly been absent for a long time as evidenced by the runaway growth and stink of rotting vegetables.
“Whoa. What is this place?” asked Josh. “What are all these piles of junk here for?”
“They used to be houses.” Sienna pointed at the repaired one. “They didn’t really look like that either, but before the Great Death, the wealthy lived in places like this.”
“Wealthy?” asked Cheyenne, scrunching her nose in confusion. “What does that mean?”
Raven started walking to
the garden, the others trailing after her.
“Before the Arc, people had this stuff called credit. They gave it to each other in trade for things like food, clothing, toys, basically everything,” said Sienna. “If someone gave away too much credit, they got in trouble and all their stuff was taken away. Wealthy means people had a lot of that credit stuff to use. They used to call those who had these big private living places ‘Boomers.’”
“Did they blow stuff up?” asked Xan.
Cheyenne and Ariana giggled.
Sienna made an ‘I don’t know’ face. “The book didn’t really say why they called them that. Just that Boomers owned houses and everyone else had to live in apartments.”
Raven peered over the fence at the garden, noting tomato plants, carrots, cucumbers, greens that looked like potato plants, and a few others she didn’t recognize, but also appeared to be vegetables. A brownish muck covered the ground from at least a full season’s worth of rotten vegetables that had fallen, but the garden had enough good-looking veggies to make at least a few meals out of.
“What are ’partments?” asked Tinsley.
“They sounded like giant houses where a lot of people lived in small rooms.” Sienna peered over the fence into the garden as well.
Raven glanced at her. “Wealth? Credit? I don’t remember learning any of that in school.”
“Because they didn’t teach us about it. We don’t use credit in the Arc. Everyone just gets what they need. The book had handwritten notes in the margins telling me not to teach those parts because someone thought it would lead to a recreation of the greed-based society that caused the Great Death.”
“If it’s off limits, why tell us about it now?” asked Raven.
Sienna shrugged. “We broke the big rule already and went outside. What’s stepping on a few lesser rules?”
“That’s stupid,” said Tinsley.
Raven and Sienna glanced at her.
“They wanted to stop us from doing the same bad stuff,” said Sienna. “Credit is bad.”
“No.” Tinsley shook her head. “That’s not what I meant. It’s stupid to just not say anything. You should teach about it and that it’s bad, so we know what not to do.”
The Girl Who Found the Sun Page 28
