Djanet had saved them. At the last moment, she had seen the surface-to-air missile approaching them out of the corner of her eye. She had turned and instinctively generated a protective magnetic field that sheltered her and her companions from a direct hit that would have been fatal for all of them. She had gone down on one knee and looked up in the direction of where the missile had come and followed the cotton-smoke trail to where three darkly dressed figures were scrambling down a small hill and toward a jet-black ridge.
“What the hell was that?” Old-timer reacted, still holding his hands over his ears as the explosion continued to echo softly in the distance.
“People!” Djanet shouted. “I’m going after them!” she announced, already in the air and about to ignite her magnetic field. She streaked toward their assailants before the others were even aware of what was happening.
“Follow her!” Thel shouted as Old-timer and Rich lifted off and bolted after her. Thel held James’s face close to hers and whispered into his ear, “You were right. There are people here, James. We’re going to find you a doctor. Just hold on, my baby.”
He struggled to open his eyes into narrow slits and spoke in a labored murmur, “I love you.”
“I know you do. I know. But I need you to stand, James. Don’t give up. Hold on to me as best you can. We have to follow them.”
James slowly got to his feet, leaning heavily against Thel for support as he did so. He’d entered the realm of the dying now. He was becoming aware that he could no longer function without the aid of one of his companions. He could not stand alone, walk alone, go to the bathroom alone, or eat alone. Soon he would be unable to speak, unable to open his eyes, and eventually, he would no longer be able to draw breath. This realization wasn’t met with panic, but rather, was accompanied by a pervasive calmness that stretched its black cloak around him as it softly rocked him toward a lasting sleep.
Thel could sense this, and she clenched her teeth in determination to beat back the alluring rest James desired as she ignited her magnetic field and carried James with her in the direction that the others had flown.
Meanwhile, several hundred meters away, Djanet was stalking her prey. She hovered above the three attackers as they scrambled as fast as they could over the uneven terrain. They were trapped and knew it, but they ran anyway, having no other option.
This was exactly the sort of moment that defined Djanet’s life. As she glided overhead, she thought of her mother, remembering how she told her to put dreams of a life working for the Governing Council on other planets out of her head. “How would you stand out?” her mother asked. Djanet, her mother insisted, could be no smarter than anyone else and those positions would always go to those centenarians already established. “Why set yourself up for failure when a lifetime of leisure was only as far away as a click in your mind’s eye?”
But Djanet was rebellious, stubborn, and determined. Her life had to have a higher purpose. She couldn’t spend her life only existing. Why live if not to pursue a dream?
And now Djanet was taking that determination and purpose and focusing it on a new goal. Everything had been taken away from her, but it wasn’t over yet. If James needed a doctor, by God he was going to get one, and these people who were scurrying away from her as quickly as possible were going to help her—like it or not.
Djanet was quickly joined on either side by Rich and Old-timer. Old-timer signaled to her to move in and block the progress of the three fleeing Purists. She nodded and swooped down, landing with enough force to be intimidating and sending small globes of sludge splattering into the air.
She was only meters in front of the ragged, battle-scarred soldiers. Their faces were blackened by the sooty material in the air and on the ground, and their skin was streaked with blood and sweat. Each wore cloth over their faces to help them breathe the putrid air. There were two males and one female, all wearing the same dark gray uniform with a rifle strapped over one shoulder. One of the men pointed his rifle at Djanet in a defensive posture, while the other two combatants took similar positions against Rich and Old-timer behind them. The six people locked into a tableau together, as painful seconds ticked by.
Old-timer felt a responsibility in the situation to be the first one to lower his guard for a moment to communicate with the Purists. It only seemed right. If one of them had to die, it should be the one who had already had the longest life. Yet his hands shook. The nans would have released a mild dose of dopamine in this situation to keep his nerves from getting the best of him. It had been more than sixty years since he had experienced such nervous feelings. He knew he could die. The implacable void of death surrounded him, and ice seemed to form in his chest. He couldn’t imagine a worse feeling.
Carefully, he disengaged the protective cocoon of his magnetic field. He did, however, keep a large magnetic shield hovering just in front of him so that he would have a chance of blocking one of the projectiles the antiquated weapons of the Purists were ready to fire.
“We aren’t here to harm you! We’re on your side!” Old-timer found himself stammering. His lips were dry and shaking—his voice nearly failed him. His voice had never before failed him.
The man and the woman who crouched before him, their weapons trained on their adversaries, gave each other careful, quizzical glances.
Old-timer waited for a few moments for a response, but the tableau continued. “Djanet, they must not speak English! Perhaps they speak one of the old languages? Spanish?”
“I haven’t practiced any Spanish since I was a little girl, Old-timer, but I can try,” Djanet replied. “Somos sus amigos. Nosotros no tenemos malas intenciones!”
The Purists shared more quizzical glances. A few moments passed before the male facing Djanet replied, “I don’t know what the hell that freak just said, but we’re not as backward as you cyborgs think! We know how to speak English!”
The tableau continued a moment longer before Old-timer finally managed to utter, “You do?”
“No! I’m lying to you! I don’t speak a damn word of English! I memorized this phonetically just to piss you off at the right moment!” the Purist shouted back at him.
“Gernot! Watch your mouth!” the woman called back to her companion.
“Why should I?” Gernot responded. “You think these freaks are telling us the truth? If I’m gonna die right now, I’m sure as hell going to tell these pieces of crap where to go before I do!”
“You’re not going to die!” Old-timer reassured. “We’re here for help! The A.I. has wiped out everyone who was connected to the Internet other than me and my companions! We’ve come here looking for other survivors!”
“It...can’t be,” whispered the man to the woman crouched next to him.
“We can’t trust them!” Gernot called back to his companions. “It’s all bull!”
At that moment, Rich finally disengaged his magnetic field. Like Djanet and Old-timer, he held a shield in front of him to protect himself, but his voice was still filled with trepidation as he spoke, his anxiety almost paralyzing. “So, uh...how’s it going? Are we friends yet?”
Old-timer locked an intense glare on Rich and shook his head.
“Oh,” Rich replied before shrinking back and reigniting his full cocoon.
“Why should we believe you?” asked the man who was crouched and facing Old-timer.
Old-timer took a moment to find a line of reasoning. He nearly shrugged his shoulders as he attempted to capture the right words.
Djanet jumped in before he could speak. “If we wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead.”
“Or you might keep us alive so that we could show you if there are any other survivors!” Gernot shot back. “We’re not idiots! No matter what you calculator-heads might think!”
Djanet furrowed her brow and looked across to Old-timer, who mouthed the word “calculator-head” to her quizzically.
She shook her head and held out her hands, exasperated.
“I think we s
hould trust them,” the woman asserted to the male next to her, who seemed to be in command of the small triad.
“Are you sure, Alejandra?”
Old-timer noted that her words carried enormous weight with their leader for some reason.
“Don’t do it, Lieutenant!” Gernot shouted.
“If you’re wrong—” the lieutenant began.
“I’m not wrong. I sense enormous good in them—especially in him,” she said, locking eyes with Old-timer.
Her eyes were unlike any Old-timer had ever seen. They carried something within them that made Old-timer see beyond the crystal blueness and into something altogether more beautiful. He didn’t know how to respond.
Just then, Thel and James swooped into the scene behind Old-timer and Rich. Their appearance was sudden and startled the lieutenant. “You said you were the last!” the lieutenant yelled.
“What?” Gernot shouted before turning to see even more assailants approaching. He opened fire with the instinctive response of a trapped mouse watching a hawk swoop down toward it. With no more room for flight, it was time to fight.
4
The battle was over almost before it began. Bullets on fire bounced off the protection of Thel’s magnetic field harmlessly, while Old-timer reengaged his full protection. Gernot’s back was now turned on Djanet, and it was only a matter of a quick thought before energy flashed toward him, instantly rendering him unconscious. The lieutenant and Alejandra watched in horror as he fell over limply, his face planting into the soft, dead earth.
“What did you do to him?” the lieutenant demanded, panic still the tune of his vocal cords.
“I’ve had enough of this,” Djanet asserted as she flashed more energy out toward the weapons to which the Purists clung. The guns were knocked out of their hands and sent flying several meters away. Once she had disarmed them, Djanet strode over to Alejandra and grabbed her roughly by the hair, pulling her toward her. “You’re going to help us whether you like it or not!”
Alejandra responded by taking hold of Djanet’s wrist and twisting it until she sharply shrieked. In the same fluid motion, she swung her leg up and kicked her under the chin, sending Djanet tumbling backward onto the ground.
“Don’t touch me.”
Old-timer quickly disengaged his magnetic field and ran over to Djanet’s aid while Alejandra and the lieutenant tended to Gernot.
“We shouldn’t be fighting!” Old-timer shouted. “We’re all on the same side!”
“You said you were the last!” the lieutenant replied, indignantly.
“We are!”
“Then who the hell are they?” the lieutenant demanded, pointing toward Thel and James. Thel was helping James lie down against the cold, black ground.
“That’s the last of us. The people you see before you are all that’s left. Believe me!”
“What did she do to Gernot?”
“Your companion is fine,” Old-timer replied. “She just gave him a mild shock. He’ll start to come around anytime now.” As he spoke, he watched Djanet’s eyes flutter as she, too, began to come around. A purple bruise was already beginning to form on her chin, and her lip was cut where she had apparently bitten down.
“I’m sorry about that,” Alejandra said to Old-timer as she knelt with Gernot’s head in her lap.
Old-timer looked up at her, and their eyes met once again. The blue disks stole his breath as he felt something unlike anything he had ever felt. Only one word reverberated in his mind:
Pure.
Thel entered the scene and knelt beside the Purists. She spoke earnestly to the lieutenant and Alejandra. “We need your help. If you have a doctor and medical facilities, we need to get to her right away. Our friend is dying.”
Alejandra’s eyes met Thel’s for a brief moment before she reached out and touched her arm. She smiled and then regarded the lieutenant. “We can trust them. “
The lieutenant looked exasperated as the spiraling situation nearly overwhelmed him. “Alejandra, they could kill everyone. I’d rather die than—”
“But they won’t. Trust me.”
Old-timer watched as the blue pureness calmed her companion. The heaving of his shoulders as he panted suddenly began to slow, and his eyes began to narrow and focus. What is this power that this woman has?
“Okay. We trust them.” The lieutenant then turned to Thel. “We aren’t far from our hospital. Almost everyone who is left is located in a complex three clicks from here. How bad is your wounded?”
“He’s in bad shape. We have to get him to a doctor as quickly as possible. We can transport you there if you’ll show us the way.”
“Transport us? How?”
“Piggyback,” Old-timer interjected.
“Djanet, are you all right?” Thel questioned as Djanet rubbed her neck and jaw. She was now sitting upright next to Old-timer.
“I’ll live,” she replied, grudgingly resisting the urge to fry Alejandra with the ease of a thought.
“Can you piggyback one of our new friends back to their base?”
It was clear from the look on Djanet’s face that she didn’t like the idea, but she nodded anyway. “Yeah.”
“Good. You take their leader.”
“Lieutenant Patrick,” the lieutenant announced, introducing himself to the group. “Nice to meet you all.”
“Thank you for your help, Lieutenant Patrick,” Thel replied. “Old-timer, you take the young lady.”
“Alejandra,” Old-timer said. He didn’t know why he said it. Nervousness was beginning to capture him again. He hoped he wouldn’t sweat.
“Rich, can you take their wounded man?”
“I’m not wounded,” replied Gernot. “I’m fine. Although I owe that bi—”
“Just try it, junior,” Djanet replied, acid dripping from her voice.
“I’m not scared of you, cyborg!”
Djanet responded by igniting an energy field in front of her and elongating it until it was only centimeters from Gernot’s face.
Frightened, he jerked his head back. “Yeah, whatever, you calculator-head!”
“Oookay, so I get to transport the psycho,” Rich whispered to Thel. “Good. I’m really happy about this. I think this will be fun. Thank you, Thel.”
“I’m sorry, Rich. We have no choice. Just drop him if he tries anything.”
“Yeah. After he pulls out my eye, I’ll drop him. That’ll make me feel all better.”
Thel stood to her feet. “Okay, Lieutenant Patrick. We’ll follow your lead. Everyone, let’s move out quickly!”
The three pairs awkwardly joined together. The lieutenant and Djanet barely spoke to one another. He quickly said, “Hi,” and she nodded in response.
Alejandra locked her eyes on Old-timer and smiled, but he couldn’t match her gaze. He put his head down and smiled sheepishly before saying, “Heya.”
She smiled and said, “Heya,” back.
Meanwhile, Gernot glared at Rich and spat before walking behind him. Rich closed his eyes in disgust. “You just fly nice and careful. Got that?”
Rich replied, “Yep, I’ll do my best, sir,” before quietly adding under his breath, “just please don’t eat me.”
“What was that?” Gernot demanded.
“Nothing. Clearing my throat. Ahem.”
Thel gathered James into her arms. “We’ve found a doctor, James.” He opened his eyes slightly in response and smiled. He was too weak now to help her, and she struggled to hold him in front of her.
“Okay! Let’s go!” she shouted to the rest of the group.
One by one, the pairs cocooned and lifted off the ground into a sky that was quickly growing dark.
As James was carried toward possible salvation, he opened his eyes and watched the light fade.
5
Old-timer knew that he should not have been feeling this. The last time the sun had faded into the west, he was with his wife of seventy-seven years. Another walk on the beach; Daniella always liked to wa
tch the sunset on the beach. Always. They flew down from San Antonio and watched the waves crash against the shore in Corpus Christi. At that time of year, storms forming off the coast of Africa created powerful waves that would pound the shoreline. Yet, beautiful as they were, they didn’t fill him with awe; he barely paid any attention. He looked down at his toes in the sand and counted as he took each step. There was going to be an interesting interview broadcast in an hour about the next day’s download, and he wanted to be sitting in his armchair and sipping iced tea when it started. He would set himself to sleep after that and wake up early enough for a big breakfast before he headed out to Venus. The evening was perfectly comfortable. Perfectly routine. Daniella’s fingers twitched in his hand, reminding him that she was with him. Seventy-seven years of marriage, and now she was like a part of his body. They were always together, except for the hours that he spent on Venus. He liked it that way.
When he had left the Vancouver Library with the others earlier in the day, desperately praying that she would be all right, he felt as though he were frozen. The thought had never occurred to him that he would have to live without her someday. He’d landed outside of his house and broken through the door, just as James had done in his own home. By then, after flying over San Antonio and seeing it in flames, he had almost lost all hope.
What was left of her was in the backyard.
She was learning to grow flowers and had been doing something with them when it happened. There was a trowel that still had the imprint of her hand melded into the plastic handle. She had died in pain.
He had no body to cradle. No open eyes to close. No hair to touch. She was gone. He should have had a chance to say goodbye. His partner and his oldest friend was gone. Why did he ever leave her alone?
And so now, only hours later, how could he be feeling this? This body, warm on his back, arms holding tight around his chest, breath on his ear, and hot as he breathed it into his own lungs.
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