by Andrew Gates
“Why does the FCP need the ship’s coordinates so badly?” Margery wondered.
“I don’t know,” Iris replied with a shrug, though in reality, she had a pretty good idea.
“I think I know,” Margery said, putting her hand in the air. “If the FCP can access the missile, they want to know where to fire it.”
Smart girl, Iris thought. She was thinking the same thing.
“It’s a good theory, but I don’t know for certain. They didn’t say why they needed it,” Iris replied.
As much as she wanted to see the mantises gone, part of her still wondered if attacking their ship was a good idea. A nuclear missile was certainly powerful enough to destroy it, but there was so much about the mantises they still did not know. Look what missiles have already done to the planet. She put the thought out of her mind for now.
“How much longer will we stay here?” Kaitlyn wondered.
Iris shrugged.
“I don’t know that either. I don’t know anything,” she said.
The woman sighed and walked down the hall, away from the group for a moment. There were too many questions to deal with right now.
Iris leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. She remembered running through the halls with Trace. Those were the simple days, the days when life seemed so grand and full of possibility.
I wanted to help people, she recalled, reminiscing back to those times. Have I really done that?
She opened her eyes again. Greyson sat on the floor next to Selena, holding little Misha in his arms. Jallah and Margery stood up and talked with each other. Kaitlyn chased Ophelia around in circles. Iris smiled at the sight. None of these people would have been here if she had not led them to the escape pod bay.
I have made a difference, she realized. I saved lives. The young Iris would have been proud.
The woman felt her belly. She would have the opportunity to make her mark on another life soon. Part of her just wanted the baby to be here already.
Funny, she thought, I used to be so uncertain about being a mother. Now I’m looking forward to it. Despite their plight, things seemed to be going well.
Iris closed her eyes again, but this time, visions of her dream entered her mind.
“I have not come to tell you anything, just to help you realize what you already know to be true,” a battered Trace explained in the escape pod bay.
No, not this dream again. Why can’t I forget this dream?
Iris opened her eyes as quickly as she could, but that did not stop the words from entering her mind.
“I am here to help you realize that this will all end in failure, just like everything else.”
Iris batted at her head, trying to erase the thoughts.
No, she thought, it’s not true. I can’t lose it all. Not when I’ve come so close!
A girl stood before her. She looked about 10 years old. Her hair was blonde and neatly cut. She wore a thick red sweatshirt and dirty grey sweatpants, a size or two too large for her tiny body. Iris recognized this child. It’s me, she realized.
“Nobody can live forever,” the girl said. “That’s impossible.”
“No, you’re just a vision. Get out of my head!” Iris replied. She was practically yelling.
What is happening? What is my mind trying to tell me? Iris felt her belly again.
“Iris!” another voice said.
She turned to face the noise. Ophelia was running her way. She seemed worried. Iris turned back to face the vision again, but the girl had disappeared.
“What is it?” she asked as Ophelia continued running to her.
“What is it? I was about to ask you that question,” the girl replied. She stopped about a meter before her. “You just yelled at the floor!”
Iris blushed. She did not mean to make a scene.
“Oh, I…” she struggled to find the words.
“I just wanted to come and check on you,” Ophelia explained.
“Why?”
Ophelia made a confused expression.
“Why? Because I care about you,” she said, as if the answer was obvious. The girl motioned to the rest of the group behind her. “We all care about you.”
We care about you. Iris did not know why this news came as such a surprise. Hearing the words made her smile. She sighed and wiped her face.
“Thanks,” she said. “I… I don’t know what got into me.”
“Are you okay?”
Iris nodded.
“Yeah, I think.”
Ophelia grabbed her by the hand and pulled down. Iris got the hint and sat down on the floor. Ophelia sat next to her.
“You want to talk about it?”
Iris took a deep breath.
“Remember when you asked me if we were going to die?” Iris said.
Ophelia nodded.
“Well… I’ve been thinking about that exact question a lot lately,” she explained. “It has me worried.”
“You told me we can’t know what to expect. The future is uncertain.”
“I did say that. And yet, I can’t help but feel like the future is set in stone, like I’m destined to die,” Iris explained.
She looked at Ophelia. The girl listened intently. Iris could not believe she was confiding in a child of all people, but it felt right. There was no one else she felt more comfortable sharing these words with.
“When my father died, he said he was afraid because he knew he would never dream again,” Iris continued. “That’s a lot to think about. I guess we all have that thing we’re most afraid of.”
“What are you most afraid of?”
Iris looked down to her belly. She did not realize she was still rubbing it.
“I guess losing everything. Not being remembered,” she answered.
Ophelia sighed.
“You saved all of us. We can’t forget you. You made a difference in our lives!” she explained.
“I know, I know. That’s the thing. I helped people. And helping people is what I’ve always wanted to do. Every time I achieve what I’ve wanted, things go badly.”
“I think you’re overthinking it,” Ophelia said. Her bluntness was strangely refreshing.
Iris let out a deep sigh.
“You’re probably right,” she agreed.
Iris turned to Ophelia and ran her fingers through the girl’s hair. She stared at her and admired the color in her eyes. It made her smile.
“Blue.”
“What?”
“The color in your eyes,” Iris explained. “It’s blue.”
“I thought you said that was the color of water and sky.”
“It is, but it’s also the color in your eyes.”
“Yours are the same color,” Ophelia noted.
Iris nodded.
“It’s pretty. I used to think it was an ugly color, but then I saw the sky and now I think it’s beautiful. You helped show me that, Iris.”
Iris felt herself blush again.
“You showed me a lot too,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“You showed me what motherhood means. I hope you know, Ophelia, I care about you a lot. I know it hasn’t been a long time, but I feel like I’ve bonded to you in ways I could have never imagined,” Iris explained.
“In what ways?”
Iris knew what she wanted to say, but had trouble saying it. She paused for a moment, building up the courage.
“Like a daughter,” she finally said.
Ophelia’s face lit up like the sun. A single tear streamed down from her right eye.
“Thank you,” the girl replied. She leaned in for a hug. Iris embraced her. “I’ve been thinking the same thing.”
“You have?”
Ophelia let go of the embrace and nodded. More tears came down now.
“I never had a good relationship with my real mom. My dad was all I had. But I feel like you… you…” Ophelia struggled to find the right words. “You care,” she finally said. “You can talk to me an
d make me feel… feel… loved.” That word hit her hard. Iris felt herself tear up now too. “Living up here on the surface is hard, but having you here makes it easier.”
Iris could not control herself. She leaned in and gave Ophelia the biggest hug she could muster. She lowered her head onto the girl’s shoulder and started crying. Ophelia cried back.
The two of them held this position for what felt like enough time to walk through the cave and back. Iris knew it must not have been nearly that long, but it was as if time had slowed down. Neither of them said a word. They simply embraced and shared tears.
Suddenly Iris felt another cramp. She pulled away from Ophelia and held her hands to the pain, pressing down hard.
“Are you okay?” Ophelia said through the tears. There was a sense of urgency to her voice.
“Yes, I’m… I’m fine,” Iris replied. She was getting tired of telling people that whenever they asked.
“It’s the baby, isn’t it?” Ophelia asked.
Iris nodded and took deep breaths to distract herself.
“Yeah.”
Ophelia paused.
“Do you think it’s a boy or a girl?”
“I don’t know,” Iris replied, shaking her head. “There’s no way of knowing.”
“What do you hope?”
Iris shook her head again.
“I… I don’t know. I just want the baby to be healthy and safe.”
“I hope it’s a girl,” Ophelia said.
Iris looked at her.
“Why do you say that?”
“Because if it’s a girl, I’ll finally have a sister.”
Those words brought another smile to Iris’s face. She had not felt so loved in a long time, years even. Not in her wildest dreams did she ever expect to have a relationship like this with a child, especially with one she hardly knew until recently.
Suddenly the lights started to flicker. Iris looked up to the ceiling. Dust fell down into the hall. Iris coughed.
Thud, thud, thud!
A stomping sound echoed.
“What is that?” Ophelia asked, pulling her head back.
Iris continued to look up to the ceiling. The sounds seemed to be coming from up there.
“Something is above us,” she replied. “Something is walking.”
“On the surface, you mean?”
Iris nodded and looked down at Ophelia.
“Yeah. This is the top floor of the building. That means it’s got to be coming from the surface above us.”
“Mantises?”
Iris shrugged, though it was a good guess.
“What is that?” Greyson asked, standing up. Misha was crying in his arms. “Did you hear it?”
“Is it the mantises?” Jallah wondered, repeating Ophelia’s question. His eyes were wide. He was shaking.
“I don’t know, maybe,” Iris replied. She stood up and walked to the rest of the group.
“The lights flickered. You saw that, right?” Jallah asked.
“Yes, Jallah, we all saw it,” Greyson confirmed. He turned to his crying girl. “Ssh, calm down, Misha. Please, calm down.”
“We’re probably safe down here, right?” Margery wondered. “The mantises don’t know about the cave entrance.”
“What if they find it by accident just like we did?” Jallah added. His words were rushed. “We didn’t know this was here either!”
“The mantises are big. We had to break through a small window to get down here. They probably can’t fit!” Ophelia said, jumping in.
“Probably can’t fit. We don’t know that! What if they decide to make the hole bigger with bombs or those cannons?” Jallah replied.
“Enough!” Greyson said, putting his daughter down on the floor. Misha immediately crouched down and balled up as if she were shy. “We don’t even know if the mantises are up there at all! It could be that a tree fell down, or a storm.”
“That noise sounded like footsteps, not a tree,” Margery challenged.
“Trees don’t sound like that,” Jallah agreed.
Greyson sighed and wiped his face.
“I think what he means is that we should expect for the worst, but hope for the best. We don’t know enough about the situation yet. It may not be mantises, but it’s certainly a possibility. So we should be careful,” Iris explained.
“Not entirely what I was going for, but good enough,” Greyson said with a shrug.
Footsteps echoed in the hall behind them. Iris turned around to find Dan rushing their way.
“Did you hear that?” the running man shouted from the other end of the hallway.
“We all did. We were just discussing it,” Greyson replied.
Dan joined the others. He was panting as if he had just sprinted as fast as he could from one end of the building to the other. That may have very well been what happened.
“It’s probably the mantises, don’t you think?” he asked through deep breaths.
“Yeah!” Jallah added, wasting no time.
“I knew it. They never left. They’ve been here all day. We killed their own. I knew they’d be looking for us,” Dan franticly said, practically ranting.
“Hold on, we don’t know that!” Greyson challenged.
“I know what you’re about to say, Grey, and you’re out of your mind if you think I’m going to listen,” Dan replied. He held his hand out towards his brother.
“What am I going to say?”
“You’re going to say that we should stay here and wait it out.”
“That’s true,” Greyson admitted.
“And I’m going to say, that’s crazy. If the mantises are here, we need to leave. The longer we wait, the more likely they’ll find us here,” Dan explained.
Oh no, not the fighting again, Iris thought.
“What? You mean go outside?” Jallah asked. “Right now?”
“No, not right away. We give it a few minutes to let them pass, then go outside. Hopefully we have a window of opportunity and we can get out of here unseen,” Dan responded.
“Hopefully. That’s the key word,” Greyson challenged.
“If we stay here, they’ll almost definitely find us eventually. If we leave, we might be able to get out of this area and put them behind us.”
“They have to give up the hunt at some point. They won’t be out here forever. It’s been less than 24 hours. Give it time,” Greyson replied.
“Ryan killed one of them, maybe more than one! The mantises aren’t giving up this time. I wouldn’t if I were them,” Dan explained.
That was a frightening thought.
Greyson sighed and wiped his face again.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but let’s put it to a vote,” the younger brother suggested.
Selena sat up and coughed. Apparently she was awake.
“Fine,” Dan replied. He spun around, making sure to face everyone in the group. “If you want to get out of here and put some distance between us and the mantises, maybe get some food while we’re at it, raise your hand.”
Dan, Jallah, Margery, Ophelia and Iris all raised their hands. Iris was not sure what prompted her to agree, but she felt like it was the right thing to do.
“Shit,” Greyson said, counting the votes. That was the majority. Dan had it.
“It’s settled then,” Dan said. “We leave the Megastructure.”
Greyson nodded reluctantly. He looked down to his seated wife.
“Fine,” he said through a deep breath. “Give us time to get ready. Selena is slow.”
“I know. I understand,” Dan replied.
“If we leave, we won’t be able to contact the FCP again. I hope you realize that,” Selena said in a hushed voice. It sounded like it pained her to speak.
Dan nodded.
“I’m fine with it. They need us more than we need them.”
“Mommy, are we really going back outside?” Kaitlyn asked.
“Yes, we are,” Selena replied.
“But what about
the monsters? What if they kill us?”
Those words brought a shiver down Iris’s spine. As much as she tried to forget it, the words suddenly came back to her again.
Nobody can live forever. That’s impossible.
NOTHING IS SAFE. NOTHING IS safe. Nothing is safe.
Jallah had not felt the comfort of safety since the zombies. Sleeping was nearly impossible. Practically every time he closed his eyes, he had another nightmare. Having Margery around helped. She was always able to calm him down somehow. But even with her around, an untamable fear always lingered in the back of his mind.
Unlike Jallah, Dan seemed confident. Everything he said felt like a certainty. Jallah could tell he truly believed in his plan to move west. The problem was getting there. The forest was full of monsters, both big and small. But deep down, Jallah believed that a safe home was out there somewhere. They just had to find it.
The first challenge was getting out of the area without detection. It was hard to leave the Pentagonal Megastructure, or just “the Megastructure,” as Dan had taken to calling it. The ancient fortress was the only place that felt like home since the cave. Abandoning the structure meant leaving a place of comfort, though Jallah understood why it was the right thing to do. As if leaving this sanctuary were not hard enough, Selena needed extra attention getting out. Grey had to help her just to move around.
Jallah felt bad for her. Selena had a strong will and a loving heart, but her body had just given out. He hoped he would not get sick with the same illness.
The boy sighed as he stepped over a mossy rock. The group was deep into the forest now. So far it seemed like they had successfully lost the mantises, but Jallah did not want to get his hopes up. He had been disappointed far too many times already.
“Are we there yet?” Misha asked, breaking the dead silence.
“Ssh, keep your voice down,” Grey replied in a whisper.
The Georgopolis kids were so annoying. They always talked at the wrong time. Don’t they know we’re trying to be quiet?
“But I want to know!” the girl pleaded.
“We’ll get there soon. But I need you to be quiet, okay?”
“Okay.”
Misha stopped talking. I hope she doesn’t start again.
