In the After

by Demitria Lunetta

  The ground felt cooler under my feet and I could tell I was nearing the lake. A twig broke, making me cringe at the sound in the relative quiet. Every day I had to remind myself that I was safe here. Vivian was right: being safe was worth living in a strange system. I kept telling myself this too.

  When I reached the lake, I paused to take in the view, the serenity. A loud noise off to the right made me freeze, my heart jumping into my throat. Something was there; I heard it loping in my direction.

  One of Them.

  I almost panicked. It was daylight and I was completely exposed.

  “Amy?”

  I wheeled around and almost collapsed with relief.

  “Rice.” Instantly I was back in New Hope and out of the world of the After. Rice wore his familiar white coat and jeans and carried a duffel bag.

  “What are you doing?” he asked curiously.

  My heart was still pounding from the adrenaline. I took a deep breath to calm myself. “I . . . um . . . was out for a run,” I explained. “I heard you coming this way and . . .”

  He looked at me. “Am I really that loud?” he asked.

  “Yeah, you are.” I laughed shakily. “I figured you were either a freight truck or a Florae.”

  “At least I don’t snarl.” He grinned.

  “Or, more important, eat human flesh,” I added, suddenly self-conscious of the way I looked. I was drenched in sweat from my run. I wiped my face with my sleeve.

  He looked me up and down. “It’s nice to see you out here. . . . Why aren’t you wearing shoes?”

  I shrugged. “It’s easier for me to run without them. Where are you headed anyway?” I asked, pointing to his duffel bag.

  “I’m going to check on a couple of sonic emitters. I usually do four or five a morning; that way I can make the rounds in a week. . . .”

  “Have they ever broken?”

  “Once or twice the solar panels shorted. They’re strategically placed,” he assured me. “If one isn’t working, then the others will compensate.”

  “But what if two stop working?” I asked, unnerved at this new information. No one else in New Hope seemed to think there was any chance the Floraes could break through the sonic shield. They didn’t even question it.

  “There’s no Floraes around for miles anyway. It’s more of a precaution.” Rice adjusted the duffel bag, slinging it over his shoulder. “Do you want to come check them out with me?” I glanced at my watch. I had thirty minutes before I was supposed to meet Kay, which meant that I had to head back now.

  My curiosity got the better of me, though. That and the fact that I really liked being with Rice, liked how he made me feel understood. Alive. “Sure,” I said.

  He took off walking slowly and I followed him. He kept watching me as we walked, making me even more self-conscious.

  “What? Why do you keep looking at me?” I asked finally.

  “Nothing. It’s just . . .” He smiled. “You’re . . . um . . . so damned quiet. It’s amazing.”

  I smiled. “You should see Baby sneak around.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked, suddenly serious.

  “She’s just very stealthy,” I tried to explain as we walked. “She knows how to move without making any noise at all. . . . You have to if you want to avoid the Floraes.”

  “Did you teach her how to be quiet?”

  “No, I didn’t have to teach her anything. Even as a toddler, she already understood. Plus we’ve had years of practice. I can try to make more noise,” I offered, “if that helps.”

  “No, don’t worry about it. We’re here now anyway.” He led me into a clearing. “We keep all the emitters out in the open so the sun can get to their solar panels,” he explained. “They all have backup batteries that are good for forty-eight hours, and a distress beacon in case they are somehow damaged by a storm or an animal.”

  I expected it to be more imposing, but the emitter was just a two-foot-high box with a satellite dish attached.

  “The panels move to face the light,” Rice told me as he tinkered with the box panel. “This little guy can cover a four-mile radius.”

  “Impressive,” I said. “I wish I’d had one of these at my house.”

  “You seem to have done okay without one.” He stood, wiping his hands.

  “It would have been nice to have neighbors.” I was overcome with a great sense of loss for all the years wasted, when I could have been in New Hope. I turned away and put my hands over my eyes but a sob still escaped.

  Then there were firm arms around me and I was sinking into Rice’s chest. “I’m sorry.” I sniffled. “I guess I’ve been due for a breakdown since coming here.”

  “It’s okay,” he told me kindly.

  “How do you deal with it? You lost someone right in front of you.”

  He shifted away a little but kept an arm around me. “I work . . . a lot.” He paused. “Does running help you cope?”

  “It does . . .” I lifted my head and looked into his warm eyes. “Except when I hear you and think a Florae is after me.”

  He smiled down at me. We stared at each other, and suddenly he bent his head and kissed me softly. I was startled at first, then felt myself returning the kiss. It only lasted a few seconds. And as he pulled away, he looked in my eyes and said, “It’s all going to be okay, you know.” I stared at him and nodded, my legs feeling weak with nervous excitement.

  “Do you want to help me finish the rounds?” he asked, giving me a last squeeze before breaking away and adjusting his glasses.

  I looked at my watch. “Oh, I should really get back.” I was already going to be late, but Kay would kill me if I didn’t show up at all. “But I’ll see you later?”

  He nodded and I waved good-bye and hurried to the Rumble Room, where Kay was waiting. I expected to get yelled at, but instead she just smiled coldly. I would have preferred the yelling.

  “Here.” She threw something at me and I caught it between my fingers: a black cloth, smooth and light. “Go change, quickly. We have a lot to do today.”

  I was still thinking of Rice, of his lips on mine. I looked down and held out the material Kay had thrown at me. My heart surged. My very own synth-suit.

  • • •

  I lie awake as an orderly rolls a gurney into my room.

  “Ms. Harris, you need to lay down here, please.”

  I stare at him, weak and slow-minded from my last shot. I raise my head slowly, trying to prop myself up. My arms are unresponsive. The man is impatient or thinks I am being difficult to defy him. He picks me up roughly, hefting me onto the gurney. I let him fasten me in without complaint.

  As he pushes me out of my room, I wonder why I’m being carted around. “I can walk,” I tell the orderly. But he doesn’t even glance down at me. I move my hands, testing the straps at my wrists. I pull harder and Dr. Thorpe appears over my face, walking next to my gurney.

  “Amy, don’t struggle. You’ll only hurt yourself.” She smiles reassuringly. Her gray-blond bun has come undone into a ponytail that spills across her shoulder.

  “Why am I tied up?” I ask her, still puzzled. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “Remember, yesterday we talked about trying out a new procedure?” She glances down the hall, then back at me. “That’s what we’re doing now.”

  I tug at the straps again, this time more forcefully. “I’ll try harder,” I tell her.

  Dr. Thorpe ignores me. “Make sure she’s secure,” she tells the orderly. “I’ll get Dr. Reynolds and meet you downstairs.”

  “Wait . . .” I yell. Dr. Thorpe disappears from view as I am wheeled down the hall to an elevator, feeling helpless. I close my eyes tight, terrified.

  • • •

  “Owwww,” I couldn’t help but yowl, even though I knew it would make Kay come at me twice as hard.

  “Toughen up,” she said. She took another swipe at me with her practice knife. This time she got me in the ribs and I gasped as a sharp pain shot through my
abdomen.

  “Jeez, give the kid a break,” Gareth shouted. He was small and wiry, and we often sparred together. I glanced up and noticed they were all watching us now. Even Rob, who wouldn’t give me the time of day, since I wasn’t technically one of them yet.

  “Like the Floraes will?” Kay called. She was right. If she had been a Florae—if one got a claw in me—I’d be dead.

  I wasn’t used to the synth-suit, the way it clung to my body and muffled my movements. It was lightweight and skintight, which almost made me feel naked. You had to pull it over your body like panty hose. There were pockets too, little compartments to hold things, like a knife or a superthin compass.

  Kay lunged at me. In each hand she clutched a knife, trying to simulate hand-to-hand combat with a Florae. I heard her foot loudly make contact with the mat and I could tell she was off balance. I parried her blow and pulled her arm forward. She fell on her side and I placed my practice knife at her throat, tracing the line of her neck with its rubber tip.

  “You’re dead,” I told her.

  “Good job, Harris,” Marcus yelled. I looked up and grinned. Marcus was one of the military badasses; to get a compliment from him was just short of amazing. Suddenly the world shifted and I was flat on my back, the wind knocked out of me.

  “Don’t gloat,” Kay told me from where she sat on my chest. “Now, you’re dead.”

  She stood up smoothly and offered me her hand, winking as she pulled me up. I was improving and she had just given me the Kay equivalent of a compliment.

  “Pair up,” she yelled. “Half-hour rumble before we hit the shooting range.”

  I headed over to Gareth. He’s wasn’t like the Guardians who were former military; he was more of a smart-ass than a hard-ass.

  “You’re looking good out there,” he said as we began to spar. Gareth wasn’t nearly as aggressive as Kay, though he did get a knife to my shoulder. “That synth-suit accentuates your . . . talents.”

  “You old perv!” I was trying not to blush. He was always acting flirty with me, even though he’d told me that I wasn’t his type, being a girl and all.

  “Old!” he yelled, dropping his guard and allowing me to stab him in the arm. I knew that would get him. Although Gareth was only twenty-five, his hair was almost entirely gray. He was living proof that the life of a Guardian is stressful.

  “You’re getting really good, Amy.” He smiled, rubbing his arm. “Even Marcus and the Elite Eight have noticed.”

  I looked over to where the intense training was going on. The Elite Eight were the military personnel who were on the Hutsen-Prime compound when the Floraes showed up. Kay led the Guardians, but Marcus was her second in command.

  “If you care what the Elite Eight think so much, maybe you should put on about twenty pounds of muscle and try to join them,” I teased.

  “Then they’d have to change their name to the Nimble Nine,” he joked. He came up next to me and surveyed the training area. “That Jenny is as fast as a Florae,” he observed.

  She was quick, dancing circles around her partner, Rob. She used her knives as an extension of her arms, lunging, stinging, moving away.

  “Floraes are faster,” I said, shaking my head. There was no way to fend off a Florae without a gun or a bow. All I really knew was that the farther away they were, the better your chance for survival. “Seriously, Gareth, do you think this will help, if you’re actually alone with a Florae?” I asked.

  “It definitely helps.” I was surprised to hear no doubt in his voice. “It’s mostly the synth-suit that will protect you, but not panicking, being able to kill without hesitation, that’s what will keep you alive.”

  “Less talking, more fighting,” Kay yelled at us from across the room. I didn’t know how she saw me roll my eyes, but she called out, “Amy, come here. I want to demonstrate something.”

  I looked at Gareth. “Oh, crap.”

  “You’re on your own, honey,” he said, holding up his hands and backing away from me.

  I made my way over to Kay, debating whether or not to pull on my synth-suit hood to protect my face. I decided against it, hoping she would go easy on me. Bad strategy.

  In three moves she had me on the floor. I tried to get up but she hit me twice in the face. I groaned, the metallic taste of blood in my mouth.

  “Next time, sunshine,” she told me, “wear your hood.”

  “What happened to you?” Vivian asked, her voice heavy with concern when I arrived twenty minutes late to class.

  “Kay Oh punched me in the face,” I told her. It was more of a chop than a punch but, either way, my face ached; the area around my eye had already begun to turn dark purple.

  “What? Why did she do that?”

  “It’s a long story. She was trying to help me, if you can believe it.”

  “Remind me to never ask Kay Oh for help,” she said, studying my bruise. “But seriously, why did Kay hit you?” she asked. Then understanding dawned on her face. “You’re training to be a Guardian, aren’t you?” she whispered.

  “No one can know,” I said, but I was relieved that she’d figured it out. I’d wanted to tell her, if just to vent, but Kay was adamant that it had to be kept secret.

  “I won’t tell anyone, I promise. Just be careful.” She reached for my hand, squeezed it. I looked at her face—her scar—my eyes tracing the white line.

  “Vivian, you never told me. What happened to you?” I asked.

  She surveyed the class and then motioned to the door. “Let’s go for a walk.”

  Outside in the fresh air, it was a while before Vivian began to speak. We watched the Class Twos on the playground. I looked for Adam but didn’t spot him.

  “We were trapped in our apartment building,” she finally said, sounding distant. “My parents were out. They probably died right away. We were stuck. We couldn’t leave, not with the Floraes on the loose. We barricaded the front doors and the stairs and holed up in the top apartment. It was me, my brother, and a couple of people we knew from our building. We weren’t thinking long term, we just wanted to survive each day.” Her face was strangely calm though her voice was heavy with misery.

  “We had electricity for a couple of days. But you know, the news was so grim, it was almost a relief after the power went out and we couldn’t listen to the radio anymore. We had no contact with the outside world. For all we knew, we were the only people left on the planet.” Vivian tugged at her necklace.

  “We ran out of food after a month. We were careful, basically starved ourselves to conserve what we had. My brother and the old man from 7B went to search the other apartments.” Her voice quavered at the mention of her brother. “They never came back. A Florae must have gotten in somehow.

  “We heard it eventually, clawing at the door. It wanted us. One woman wouldn’t stop screaming. We . . . there was a man, one of our neighbors; he was going to kill her to shut her up. I tried to stop him, but he was too strong. He knocked me out. When I woke up, the woman was dead, lying in a pool of blood with a slit throat. My face hurt when I touched my cheek.” She caressed her face. “It was wet. I thought it was from my tears, but then I looked down and my hand was covered in blood.”

  “What happened to the man, the one that killed the woman?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. He was gone when I woke up. I thought maybe he felt guilty and jumped off the roof. I couldn’t deal with being alone, so I went up there to do the same. Going up those stairs in the dark, I was convinced a Florae would attack at any second.” Wiping her eyes, she looked over at me.

  “Oh, Amy, I just wanted to die. My parents were gone, my brother; the entire world was dead—but I didn’t want a Florae to kill me. I’d rather have done it myself.”

  I nodded knowingly.

  “It’s a miracle,” she told me. “I was going to jump when I heard a thud behind me. The Guardians saw me on the roof. They came to rescue me.”

  She fingered the gold cross suspended above her breastbon
e. “This was my mother’s. I always thought all that religious stuff she tried to get us to believe was crap, but standing there on that rooftop, no hope in my heart, and being saved by the Guardians . . . I thought they were angels. I know I was half starved and delusional with grief, but at that moment I believed my mother had sent them to me. I still do. I light a candle every Sunday and thank God I’m alive.”

  I wrapped my arms around Vivian and gave her a gentle squeeze. I wasn’t able to take away her horrible memories, but I could share her pain. Vivian hugged back and when we pulled away she gave me a small smile.

  “You’d be surprised how many of these people of science go to chapel every Sunday. People who aren’t even religious, they just want a quiet place to pray.”

  “I’m not surprised, it being the end of the world and all.”

  “I don’t think it’s really the end, you know. Just something new,” Vivian said.

  “I hope you’re right,” I told her.

  • • •

  “I feel very positive about this.” I hear Dr. Thorpe say, somewhere in the room. My body and head are secured; I can only see the ceiling.

  “How many treatments before we can hope to see signs of recovery?” comes another, older voice. Dr. Samuels.

  “It truly depends on the patient,” Dr. Reynolds says. My stomach drops at the sound of his voice. “With some, there is noticeable progress after one session. Some take more than twenty, and some never improve at all.”

  “And the memory loss?” Dr. Thorpe asks. “What are the chances that Ms. Harris will be affected? She was very concerned about that when I spoke with her.”

  “Retrograde amnesia can be a side effect. So can cognitive impairment and death. No treatment is without risk.”

  I hear footsteps and the hum of a machine. I open my mouth to protest and something is placed in it. It’s rubbery and smells like old leather. Dr. Reynolds’s head appears above my face for a moment. He licks his lips, a look of pure joy in his eyes. “Let’s begin,” he says loudly.