by Krista McGee
“I remember once—” John stops so quickly we almost fall. I am still moving; he is as still as a pod.
“What?” I look in the direction he is staring, and the landscape is changing. The ground is raised ahead of us, round like a pod but gray on the side facing us. At the top, however, it is not gray. It appears to be green. Green like the grass that grows in our recreation field. But this is not a recreation area created by Scientists. This is actual grass, untouched by the War. Undeniable proof that not all of the earth was destroyed.
“We’re close.” John pulls me along, oblivious to his injuries. “Come. Come.”
It takes us several minutes. The land is a hill—I remember this from when I was in Progress. But Progress was a simulation of life aboveground, and this is not. This is real. The effort to walk up the hill is taxing to John, but a smile never leaves his face.
When we arrive at the top, he falls to his knees, his face buried in a tall patch of grass. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
I move away, not wanting to intrude on John’s moment with the Designer.
Rhen and Berk are almost at the top. Rhen is practically dragging Berk. I run down to them, step to Berk’s other side, and help Rhen carry him up. When we arrive, John is standing. He points down the hill.
“Look.” He wipes the tears from his eyes. “We have arrived.”
CHAPTER NINE
We can see the settlement in the distance. There are pods and recreation fields and other animals, different from the dog but seemingly calm. Not like the wolves we encountered. The hope I have begun to feel grows.
“We are still far away.” Rhen surveys the settlement.
“Then let us begin now.” John puts his arm through mine and urges me down the hill. “Look—a pond.”
John releases my arm and moves quicker than I have ever seen him move. I am worried he will fall, causing further injury to himself, so I chase after him. The terrain changes as we go down the hill, closer to the pond. A strange wind blows past me, cool and moist, but I do not have time to consider what that means. John is running directly to the water.
“John, no!” He doesn’t know what’s in that water.
But the huge dog jumps in and John follows right behind, his whole body going underneath. The water is so brown, I cannot see John. I cannot swim. In Progress, I went into a lake. But I did not go under. John is in there and he is not coming up. Rhen and Berk are still far behind. I stand at the edge of the pond, my heart pounding a staccato rhythm.
“Come on in.” John is suddenly in the center of the pond. How he got there, I have no idea, but there he is, the dog right beside him, going in circles around John, who is now floating on his back. “The water is fine.”
John gulps a mouthful of water and spits it up into the air. It makes an arc and then splashes beside him. The dog lunges for it and goes under, then back up. My fear eases. John is all right. He is beyond all right. Joy that I have never seen before shines from his face. Peace, I have seen. But this is different . . . He is home.
I take a step toward the pond. The closer I get, the moister the ground beneath my feet becomes. I pull off my shoes and allow my feet to plunge deeper into the soil. It feels strangely cool. So different from the ashy dust we have covering every inch of our bodies. This feels almost clean. My feet are sinking into the ground, and I wiggle my toes. The sensation causes me to laugh. I can’t help myself.
“It is good to hear you laugh.” Berk is behind me, his breath hot on my neck. I want to turn around, to hold him, feel his heart beating. But I cannot. I should not. He is probably just speaking as a friend. Nothing more.
“Is he safe?” Rhen is next to Berk. Berk steps back, and I no longer feel his breath.
“Yes, I am safe,” John calls out. “I’m swimming. Join me.”
Rhen’s and Berk’s faces mirror what I’m feeling. We will not go into that filthy pond.
John must be tossing the water in our direction because I feel it on my head. Just a few drops at first, but then more. So much more that I am certain it cannot be John’s doing. I look around, afraid someone else is here, mocking us, flinging water at us. Then John moves toward us, his face lifted toward the sky.
“Rain!” John’s arms are spread out in front of him. His shirt and pants are dripping with pond water as he stands, smiling. I look up and notice water all around us. It is not being tossed. It is falling from the sky.
“Rain.” Rhen lifts her palm and the drops of water fall on her skin.
We learned about rain. It is part of the weather patterns that were on earth. We learned about the process of evaporation and condensation. But we did not see it. Our greenhouses had moisture imbedded in the soil. The Botanists created ways to irrigate everything without wasting water. We were taught that on earth, people splashed water around, that it ran haphazardly throughout the streets. We could not be so careless. Our water supply had to go through years of processing to become viable.
But this is not the State, and this is not a waste. It is pure water, carelessly dropping on everything and everyone. Drops splash into the pond, creating ribbons of movement all around it. It is beautiful.
I close my eyes and feel the drops run down my face, my neck, soaking my shirt. The ground seems to smell sweeter, the air feels cooler. We had showers in the pods, but they were nothing like this. Quick rinses with fast-flowing water coming out in a steady stream. This feels more like a caress.
All of us are silent in the face of the rain. It is amazing. Breathtaking. I want to share this moment with Berk, to feel him near me again. I want to apologize, to start over. I turn to see him and find he is once again with Rhen. Talking with her, standing near her, sharing our moment with her.
I am not sure if it’s the rain or my tears I feel rolling down my cheeks.
CHAPTER TEN
I hear something.” Rhen steps away from Berk, her gaze on the horizon. The village is close. We can see it in the distance. Fear creeps back into my heart—fear of what the people might be like, what dangers might be waiting for us.
“What is that?” I place my hands over my eyes. The sun is bright now, and its glare from the pond is almost blinding. The noise is getting louder, a pounding with a metallic clanging and screeching. An odd combination of sounds. I hear the dog barking and another animal sound. It seems to be attached to whatever is pounding, so it is a large animal. I try to remember my zoology lessons and once again find myself frustrated at not having paid attention.
“Horses.”
Of course Rhen would know. We all stand and watch as two horses—now I remember reading about them—pull a long metal box on wheels toward us. The box looks ancient and has holes in it that look like they were made by thousands of tiny animals taking small bites out of the metal. The spaces around the holes are a sick shade of brown. Along the side of the box are letters: D-O then a huge hole and G-E.
“Ingenius.” John claps his hands as the contraption gets closer. “A horse-drawn truck. Only in Texas.”
I don’t recall the word truck, but I cannot bother with that now. My gaze is on the man sitting behind the horses. He appears to be almost as old as John, but with no hair on his head and a long beard that is equal parts silver and black. He is holding two long ropes attached to a mechanism that keeps the horses together. He stops several feet from us and for long moments, none of us says a word.
The old man lowers himself from the truck, still holding on to the ropes. His eyes never leave us. He seems suspicious. I suppose I cannot blame him. I am suspicious as well.
“We have escaped from an underground compound in Colorado.” John finally breaks the silence.
The old man, still clutching the ropes, takes one step forward. “Colorado is a long way away.”
“We had a transport.” John motions to the spot where we left it soaking in the sun’s rays. “It broke down, but we think it might work again with a little more solar power.”
“Look, we’re simple folk
s.” The man stays rooted in place, his eyes tiny slits. “And we like it that way.”
The man speaks differently than we do. His vowels are soft and his words take longer to come out than ours. I understand him, but it is difficult. What does he think of how we speak? We must look strange to him. Even though we are wet and dirty, our clothes are very different from his. We all wear the white suits of the State. His clothes are faded but colorful, his pants a dingy blue and his shirt a combination of several colors in a variety of patterns. His shoes are caked with dirt, but even if they were clean, I am fairly certain they would still be the color of the ground beside the pond.
“We are homeless,” John says. “We are not looking to change your way of life, but we would like to join you. We are almost out of food.”
“And they are hurt.” I cannot remain silent any longer. “John fell, and Berk was attacked by wolves. Do you have a Medical Specialist?”
“We have a healer.” The man motions for us to climb in the back of his truck. “But before you see her, you need to see the Scientists.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
My heart plunges. The Scientists? They found us? Followed us here? Have they been tracking us all along? Watching as we traveled, laughing as we crashed? The four of us are silent as the truck turns around and the horses point us toward the village. The old man refuses to say any more. When we ask him about the Scientists, he just shrugs and says, “You’ll see.”
I have led my friends to their deaths. I want to turn us back around, to push the old man down and see if we can make the sixty miles to the next village. Maybe they will protect us from the Scientists.
I look at the old man, and I know I cannot do that. And if the Scientists made it to this village ahead of us, then they will surely be able to follow us to the next. I try to think about something else, anything to keep the images of Berk, Rhen, and John being annihilated from playing in my mind.
“What are those?” I point to a group of animals about the size of the horses. They are of varying colors of brown and white, wider than the horses, their thick necks bent to eat grass.
“Cows.” John rubs his long white beard. “Dairy cows, used for getting milk and cream and butter and cheese.”
“Ancient foods?” Rhen does not hide her disgust.
The foods in the State are all grown in the greenhouses or manufactured in the labs to be of optimal nutritional value. We were told the ancients ate animals and drank their secretions and that the diseases that resulted from that practice killed many. I am a little nauseous at the thought of it.
“I hope they have some beef cattle in there.” John cranes his neck to see. “What I wouldn’t give to have a juicy steak.”
“We got ’em.” The driver turns to look at John. “Over in the west pasture. What did they feed you folks up there?”
“You don’t want to know.” John and the grizzled driver share a laugh.
Beyond the fence that holds the dairy cattle, I see trees. Many trees, all together. “Are those oranges?”
“They sure are.” John smiles. “I didn’t realize Texas grew oranges. We had huge orange groves in California. A buddy of mine managed one of the largest, way down south. It was a lot of work, but they’d produce thousands and thousands of oranges every year. We used to take the kids down after he harvested. They did it with machines, but the machines missed some. So old Charlie would let us come with big baskets and take as many as we could eat. The kids would eat five or six just on the ride home, then we’d squeeze them into the best orange juice you’ve ever tasted. And Amy—” John laughs. “Amy could make all kinds of things with the leftovers. Oranges with chicken, with fish, in smoothies and cakes and muffins. She was quite a cook.”
“That sounds wonderful.” Such culinary variety was not part of life in the State.
“It was.”
The driver glances at John. “Where in California you from?”
“Just west of San Diego.”
“That was beautiful country.”
John nods. “Sure was.”
“My parents were from Sacramento.” The driver turns to face John. “We used to drive up there every summer to visit my grandparents. We always stopped in San Diego to visit the zoo.”
“We had season passes when the kids were little.” John smiles.
The driver turns back around, but he has a smile on his face. I try to imagine what this world was like before the War, when people could travel hundreds of miles and see cities all along the way, not just long stretches of dust-covered nothingness. A place filled with families and zoos and friends. I can’t fathom that world. It is strange that it existed just four decades ago, that John still remembers it so clearly.
“Look at the pods.” Berk points to the structures so different from ones in the State that they can hardly be classified as pods.
From a distance they looked a little different. Not white, but I expected that. I saw pods in Progress, and even though they weren’t real, they were modeled after the images of ancient dwellings we saw on our learning pads. But even those did not look like these. The exteriors are made from trees, cut into long pieces and fit together. Remnants of ancient homes are scattered around, obviously vacant and picked through.
John must see the questions in my eyes because he places his hand over mine. “All the homes before the War were dependent on technology. In that way, they were no different than the State. My guess is that this town survived damage from the War, but the technology was wiped out all around the globe. Easier to build something new than to try to fix the old.”
The driver turns around. His voice has an edge to it, although I don’t understand why. “We have a simple way of life here, and that’s how we like it. If you want something else, I suggest you head on over to Athens.”
John leans toward the driver. “Please excuse me if I sounded critical. I think you have a fine town, and we are grateful for your hospitality.”
The driver grunts but seems to relax in his seat. The distractions of the cows and the trees are gone, replaced again by a suffocating fear. We are almost there. Almost to where the Scientists are waiting for us. My mind races with the possibilities as the truck slows.
We are in front of a huge structure. This is different from the pods. It is made from cement—like the ends of the State. It is massive, with holes in the front I assume were once windows.
John chuckles beside me. An odd sound at a time like this. “An old Walmart.”
“What?”
But he doesn’t have time to respond because out of the structure come two older, distinguished people, a man and a woman. The man has reddish hair sprinkled with white. His fair skin is slightly wrinkled. He is thin but appears healthy. The woman has dark hair, curly but short. Her skin is a light brown—similar to my podmate Asta, who was annihilated when we were nine. The woman appears to be the same age as the man, a little heavier with fewer wrinkles and no white hair.
The driver motions to the couple. “These are the Scientists.”
I let out a loud exhale, relief replacing fear. These are not State Scientists. They do not appear to have intentions to kill us. They look curious, not angry.
“Where did you come from?”
Berk eases himself out of the truck to face the Scientists. “We are from the State. We were scheduled to be annihilated, so we escaped.”
The woman’s eyes narrow. “How did you escape?”
Berk explains his plan—stealing decontamination suits and food and a transport and a chamber, then looking up the map.
“And how do you know you aren’t being followed?” The man raises his eyebrows.
“We don’t know for sure,” Berk explains. “But we have been traveling for almost two weeks. If they were to come after us, they would have done so by now.”
“So the State still exists.” The man looks at the woman, and something unspoken passes between them.
“You know about the State?” I ask. With no technology, h
ow could they possibly be aware the State even exists?
The woman steps forward and takes a deep breath. “We escaped from the State too.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
The Scientists have ushered us into their pod. They know we have questions, but they want to ask us their questions first. They fill a table with food as they ask, and we have no choice but to answer. Actually, Berk is talking while the rest of us are eating. As curious as I am, I am even hungrier.
John devours the strange foods. I cannot bring myself to try the meat or cheese, but I do eat the fruit and vegetables. I even manage to taste what they call “dip” on a slice of carrot. It is different. A creamy texture I am sure I don’t want to know the source of. But I might try it again. Later.
“How are they accounting for the oxygen issue?” The woman is very concerned with the oxygen in the State.
I have heard variations of this question several times now. But I don’t hear Berk’s answer. I don’t want to think about the State, don’t want to talk about the State. I want to forget it, to believe we’re in a place where we are all safe.
This building is odd. It was obviously once one gigantic pod, but now it is divided into several pods. We are in a section like a living area, with places to sit and a kitchen. I wander out the door to the next section. It is larger—about the size of the music chamber in the State. There are at least two dozen chairs with desks. Some smaller than others. Bookshelves line the walls.
I have never seen a real book, just pictures of them on my learning pad. They look beautiful, all different colors and sizes. They are arranged alphabetically by author. I want to read one. We were taught that stories were for ancients because they could not deal with reality. We were conditioned to understand facts and not require any type of escape. But I escaped through music. And I loved it. I have always wondered if stories would be the same.
