The Future Was Now

by J. R. Harber

  “Eve!” Asa shouted, reaching out for her, but she was already running. The new people were only ten feet away, and she crossed the distance in a blur. Before Asa could act, she flung herself at the man in the center, knocking him back, her arms wrapped around him. He pushed her away, grasping her shoulders and bending forward to peer at her face; then he gasped and pulled her to his chest. She clung to him as he stroked her hair, and in the vast, open space, Asa could hear the sound of her crying and the echo of the man’s whispers, though he could not make out the words.

  Finally, they separated, though Eve held on to his hand as if she were afraid to let go. She gazed up at him breathlessly, and Asa looked away.

  First Daniel, now an outlaw—maybe she loves criminals, he thought.

  “Saul,” Eve said, and Asa jerked his head back up.

  Saul. Suddenly, he saw the resemblance between them. It was unmistakable—Eve’s brother looked just like her.

  “Saul,” Eve said again, “they told me you were dead … I …” Her expression changed, her eyes narrowing, and without warning, she hit him in the chest with an open hand. He jerked back, his eyes widening in surprise. “They said you were dead!” she repeated. “Did you know they told me that? You jerk!” she hit him again, as if for emphasis. “I thought you were dead. You were all I had, and you were gone …” Eve hit her brother again, this time without conviction, and he pulled her close as she began to cry again.

  “I’m sorry. Eve, I’m so sorry. It was for your protection,” he said, and she lifted a hand off his chest and hit him again, this time lightly. She moved back from him and wiped her eyes.

  “The next time someone lies to me for my own good, they’re going to need protection,” Eve said.

  She smiled at Asa, and this time her face was radiant; she looked as if years of grief had been undone, and maybe they had. For the first time since Saul appeared, Asa took note of the rest of the group, who were all looking on warily, as if Eve were a snake who might bite at any moment. He eyed Lilith, who was standing closest to him.

  “She’s his sister,” he explained quietly, and Lilith gasped.

  “Eve?” she cried. Eve drew back, startled, and Asa watched the others as understanding dawned.

  Saul laughed. “You’re a legend out here, baby sister,” he said and took her arm. “Come on, I’ll show you our world.”

  Eve yanked her arm away. “No,” she said evenly. “I want to know what happened first. You’re going to tell me why I had to mourn your death while you were off playing in this sandbox.”

  “I thought you were happy to see me,” Saul said, bewildered. “Now you’re angry.”

  “I’m both. I’m complex,” Eve snapped.

  He frowned. “I don’t understand—if you’re here, Daniel must have told you everything.”

  “He didn’t tell me anything. I didn’t know you were alive until the moment I saw your face.”

  “What?” Saul stared at her for a second, then flicked his eyes to Asa. “Come downstairs,” he said shortly.

  He took Eve’s arm again, and this time she did not protest as he started back across the cavernous room to where he had come from. Asa trailed behind them, flanked by the half-dozen guards.

  The door opened to a dimly lit staircase. The steps were concrete, leading down in a squared spiral, turning every eight steps. Asa counted as they descended, keeping his hand on the thin metal railing. The stairs ended in a long, dark corridor, and Asa put his hand on the wall to guide himself as they traversed it, blinking in hope that his eyes would adjust.

  Suddenly, light spilled out into the hall, and Asa realized Saul had opened a door and was ushering them through. He followed Eve, glancing back, but the rest of the group did not appear. They had vanished somewhere in the dark without his noticing. Saul shut the door, and Asa’s heart skipped when he heard the click of a lock.

  Maybe you can trust him, but can I? he wanted to ask her.

  He watched her instead as she moved about the room, examining everything. There was a narrow bed with a thin mattress and a bookshelf that took up the whole of one wall. It was nearly filled with books, some so used their spines had worn away, the naked pages bound with rubber bands.

  There were objects too—a little statuette of a cat and another of an enormously fat man, laughing; a little pile of shining silver tokens; a broken pot, painted bright blue; pieces of dark, flaky stone; and intricate metalworks that Asa peered at, uncertain whether they were made as art or for a different purpose. Eve picked up one thing after another, examining each with curiosity. Then she went to the desk on the opposite wall.

  It was covered in strange things, the largest of which was a screen nearly the size of the ones on the trains. A second, smaller one stood beside it. There was a flat keyboard, a jumble of wires, and a small pile of objects that looked like the tech Eve had been carrying with her.

  Asa looked at Saul, who was watching his sister with an expression of mild amusement, his hands in his pockets. He caught Asa’s glance and cleared his throat.

  “Eve,” Saul said.

  She ignored him and sat down in the desk chair, fiddling briefly with one of the wires before looking up. She sighed.

  “Eve, tell me what’s going on—”

  “Daniel’s dead,” she said flatly, cutting him off.

  “Oh.” Saul cleared his throat. “What happened?” he asked, his voice sounding choked.

  Eve picked up a small black box attached to a flat piece of green plastic by a dozen wires. “What’s this?” she asked.

  “Eve, tell me what happened to Daniel.”

  Saul sat heavily on the bed, and Asa shifted his feet, feeling suddenly obtrusive. He sat on the concrete floor, crossing his legs, and inched backward until he could lean against the wall.

  “Ask him,” Eve said with sudden hostility, jerking her chin at Asa.

  Saul didn’t look at him. “I’m not asking him, I’m asking you,” he said patiently.

  Asa smiled in spite of himself and ducked his head to hide it. I hope I don’t sound that patronizing to Hannah, he thought. His smile faded. I will see her again, he vowed.

  Eve was toying with the wires on the box. “Daniel killed himself,” she said at last.

  “Damn it,” Saul said quietly. He leaned forward and clasped his hands, staring into nothing as he knotted his fingers together.

  “You don’t sound surprised,” Asa said with a spark of hope.

  Saul shook his head slowly, not looking up. “I’m not. He had nights … he always drank too much, and sometimes he talked like that. Once I stopped him from jumping off a bridge. We were walking home after a night out, and suddenly he was on the railing, talking about the abyss, teetering two hundred feet above the road. I jumped up and grabbed him, dragged him home, and let him sleep it off. But it was too close. After that, I was afraid it was only a matter of time. You can’t talk someone out of doing something they really want to do. I figured one day he would get up on the bridge, and there would be no one there to stop him from jumping.”

  He sighed heavily. Eve looked stricken. Her hands froze on the wires as if she had forgotten how to move them.

  “You don’t think anyone could have stopped him?” she said, her voice sounding far away.

  “No,” Saul said. He looked up at her with a pained expression. “Eve, you couldn’t have stopped him.”

  “He said he loved me with all the heart that he didn’t have,” she said, still as a statue.

  “He always cared about you. It’s why I trusted him to help you after I was gone. But, Eve, you were in no position—”

  “He loved me.” She shook her head slowly back and forth, the movement almost hypnotic. “I loved him too, but not like that. I tried. He gave me everything, but I wouldn’t have his child, and I couldn’t save his life.”

  “What?” Saul stood abruptly, his face red with rage. “His child?”

  “He said he’d never had the procedure,” Eve said, going back
to the wires. She pulled one out of the box, then plugged it back in.

  Asa got to his feet quietly, keeping his eyes on Saul.

  “Eve,” Saul said, his voice so tense it almost shook. “Did Daniel … were you … did he touch you?”

  Eve dropped the gadget and looked up at him, her expression hardening. “I’m not a child, Saul.”

  “You were when I fled out here. I trusted him with you.”

  “He didn’t … we didn’t get involved until I was twenty-one.” Eve stood, matching her brother’s gaze. They glared at each other from across the room.

  Asa cleared his throat. “Um, Saul?”

  “What?” Saul didn’t take his eyes off Eve, but Asa plunged onward.

  “The reason we’re here is that Daniel jumped out a window, and I tried to stop him, like you did. But I failed. And a drone got a really good image of what I’m sure looks like me pushing him, and probably Eve too.”

  “What?” Saul eased his posture. “You’re on the run?”

  “Why do you think we’re here?”

  “I thought …” Saul glanced at Eve, who turned away. She picked up the gadget she had been playing with and pulled out another wire, then replaced it. “I thought she came to find me,” he finished without conviction.

  “She didn’t know you were alive,” Asa said.

  “She can hear you,” Eve said icily from the corner.

  “We have a plan,” Asa said. “You might be able to help.”

  Saul sighed. “I’ll see what I can do.” He turned to his sister. “Eve.”

  “What?” she asked the wall.

  “Come on,” he said, voice soft. “Let’s eat something.”

  “Fine.” She set the gadget down and came to the door, not looking at either of them.

  “Eve, I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at Daniel,” Saul said with a note of pleading.

  “Well, I’m mad at you.”

  “You’re glad I’m alive though, right?”

  Eve gave Saul a sardonic look, then took his arm again. “That line won’t work forever, you know.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  SAUL LED THEM BACK INTO THE HALLWAY and flipped a switch on the wall. Lights flickered above them for a moment, seemingly on the edge of dying, then came on, revealing beige tiled floors and dull greenish walls. They followed the corridor to another one just like it; Saul led them through a mazelike path of identical hallways, and Asa could not tell if this was really the way to something or if they were being deliberately disoriented.

  “Nice place you’ve got,” Eve said dryly, and Saul gave her an amused look.

  “It may not be pretty, but it’ll withstand just about anything,” he said. “I’ll give you a tour after dinner.”

  They eventually reached a heavy double door, and Saul shoved the bar at the middle of it, sending both sides swinging open. As they entered the hallway, it filled with soft noises. Doors on either side were cracked open, light spilling out into the hall, where the harsh bulbs overhead had been dampened somehow. An aroma wafted from a door at the end of the hall: food, though the scent was unfamiliar. Someone was playing a stringed instrument and singing along in the distance. As they passed each room, Asa could hear the murmur of indistinct voices and, once, a crying baby and the hushed tones of someone soothing it.

  Eve touched Asa’s arm, and he noticed she had fallen behind her brother. She nodded her head minutely to their left, and he glanced in the direction she indicated. A little girl, no more than six, was peering through a crack in the door, her eyes wide. Asa smiled at her and bent down to say hello, but before he could speak, someone behind her pulled her back, whispering an admonition. The door closed firmly, and he heard the sound of a lock falling into place. Asa straightened, uncertain what he had done wrong.

  Saul was waiting for them at the end of the hall, looking impatient. Eve and Asa hurried to him, and he threw open the door and grinned.

  “Welcome to the dining room,” he said.

  Asa took three steps and turned in a circle to take it all in. The room was large and filled with a rank of perhaps ten long metal tables, each large enough for ten people or more. But the size was not what held his attention. There were no windows, but there was no need for them: the walls were hung with enormous paintings, and wherever there was space among the tables, there were marble sculptures, some of human figures, others abstract and unfathomable.

  Saul ushered them to a table at the far end of the room, watched over by a painting of two red, vaguely human creatures making their way down a pink corridor. Asa sat facing away from it. Eve sat down beside him. As she sat, she took his hand under the table and squeezed it, and he smiled at her, surprised by the gesture. Her instant ease in this strange place was only serving to make him feel like more of an outsider, but he was surely grateful for her touch.

  After a few moments they were joined by the welcoming party that had detained them in the desert—Cyrus, Aquila, Simon, Lilith, and the other two men, who were introduced now as Joel and Zachariah. More people began to filter in once they were seated, but they left the tables near Asa and Eve empty. No one acted as if it were unusual, and Asa wondered if it was because of his and Eve’s presence or a deference always accorded to Saul. Asa looked for the little girl whose face he had scarcely seen on their way in, but no young children appeared at all.

  A few teenagers emerged from a door at the other end of the room, with plates and spoons and large serving dishes for each table. The meal was a kind of stew, spicier than Asa was accustomed to but tasty. He thought it was best not to ask what was in it, thinking fleetingly of the small creatures that had darted in and out of view as they drove across the arid landscape.

  “Did you build all this?” Eve asked, pointing her spoon vaguely at the room around them. “Not the decoration, the building,” she added, and Simon choked on a laugh.

  “Decoration, she says!” he said when he regained his breath. “These are masterpieces from the ancient world, young lady!”

  “They’re lovely,” Asa said hastily as Eve gave the old man a cold stare, then turned back to her brother.

  “Tell me about the building,” Eve repeated. “Who built it? How long has it been here?”

  “It’s from the old civ,” Saul said, and Asa shook his head, disbelieving.

  “It would have rotted away,” he said, “or been destroyed during the time of chaos before the Founding.”

  “Some things were made to last,” Aquila said. “This was a military bunker, supposed to withstand a nuclear holocaust.”

  Asa glanced at Eve, then back at Saul. “I only understood about half those words,” he admitted.

  “It was built to survive a war, a storm, a flood—any disaster the world could create,” Saul explained. “So far, it’s lived up to expectations. I’ll take you on a tour later. Everything we need, we produce within these walls, secure from the eyes of the State.”

  He said “State” like a curse word. He looked at Eve, who shrugged.

  “The State leaves the Waste alone,” Asa said. “You have nothing to fear from them. The only punishments out here are those inflicted by the Waste itself and …” The men and women who inhabit it. He stopped himself from saying the last part of the familiar phrase.

  After a tense moment of silence, Cyrus burst out laughing, then the others joined him. Even Saul threw back his head and roared, his shoulders shaking. Eve raised an eyebrow and waited for them to finish. When they all calmed down, she turned her eyes on Cyrus.

  “Tell us what’s so funny,” she said.

  He set his spoon down carefully beside his empty bowl. “I’m not from your State,” he said evenly. “No ancestor of mine ever set foot in that place. When the walls went up, my family stayed outside them.”

  “Why?” Asa gaped.

  Cyrus gave him a searching look. “Can you really not imagine why someone might want to remain outside the shining walls of your perfectly planned society?”

  “No,” A
sa said. “It was planned for a reason. The Founders wanted to protect us from the violence and greed that brought devastation and ruin upon the old civ!”

  His face felt hot. Eve touched his arm, and he looked down to see that he was grasping his own spoon so tightly it was beginning to hurt his fingers. He set it down.

  “Why did your family want to remain outside?” he asked, more calmly. Cyrus merely looked at him, and Lilith leaned over the table to answer.

  “Asa, I was born inside the walls like you. I know all the things they say, but there’s a cost to that well-run State you’re defending.”

  “Like what?” he challenged.

  “What are you doing out here?” she asked mildly, and he looked down at the table.

  “That was a mistake,” he said.

  “Was it a mistake that you should pay for with your lives?”

  “No,” Eve said softly.

  “They might as well know the rest,” Simon said through a mouthful of food. “Tell them about the children.”

  Asa was suddenly alert. “The children?”

  The others exchanged glances.

  “Not just children,” Aquila said. She sighed. “I’m not as convinced as Saul is that we can trust you,” she said to Eve. “You may be his sister, but I have a sister too, and she’d sell me out in a heartbeat. So, if you’re here spying for the State, we’re not telling you anything.”

  “Okay. But we’re not spies,” Eve said.

  “The State doesn’t leave us alone,” Aquila said. “Most people who run into the Waste, they do die of exposure or hunger or thirst within a few days. We help who we can, but it’s not as if we get a weekly schedule—we never know who’s coming out, or from where, and some people don’t want our help. Besides us, there are some other scattered groups, but they’re mostly living a rough life. At least, we think so.”

  “The State knows about us,” Cyrus interrupted, his face harsh with anger. “They could destroy us if they wanted to, so why don’t they?”

  “Because the Waste is its own punishment?” Asa said, doubtful that this was the answer.

  Cyrus smacked the table with the palm of his hand, making the dishes rattle. Silence fell in the dining room for a long moment, then conversation resumed, though people gave occasional sideways glances to their table.