by Joel Varty
He does not see the rapid fission of the seeds in mid-air as they change from a few small nuts to a veritable rainfall of seeds that immediately duplicate over and over and over again as they tap along the pavement and eventually roll to a stop in various positions up to several hundred metres from the pool of blood that marks their birth into this world.
Chapter Sixteen – Trees
Sgt Thomas
The city sits silently, mourning its populace that has disappeared. The buildings stand stoically, some solid, some tattered by various explosions and shockwaves, in the shadows of their peers, whilst bits of garbage and debris are blown haphazardly by the wind through the vast canyons of their realm.
As if on some unseen timer, thousands upon thousands of small red-tinted acorns begin to wiggle and twitch like so many uncomfortable children in their seats. As one they immediately sprout, roots shooting downwards through the various cracks and small crevices in the pavement or cement upon which they have fallen. As one they shoot their great impassive trunks skyward and try their best to rival their neighbours, the skyscrapers. As one they bloom great bursts of green leaves, each with a little poof of pollen, creating an almost misty effect as it is joined together.
A few pairs of eyes pierce the darkness of those shadows – though no sound of breathing can be heard save for the rush of the breezes through green leaves and shattered windows. The discourse of nature with its surroundings is not witnessed to any significance; only a few linger long enough to take it in.
In the soft light of the newly grown forest, a squad of 6 men stand watch while a grey-coated individual attempts to communicate with the central command.
Sergeant William Thomas looks out of the corner of his eye at the civilian in the overcoat as he puts his radiophone away and attempts to take a sample of the bark from one of new oak trees. Sergeant Thomas knows now why they have come. He knows now why they bombed the hell out of the roads into and out of this city.
It has nothing to do with the nation-wide fuel shortage that has frozen the nation in its tracks: that is only an imperative that has justified this punitive action against a city that housed the mind that created this technology. It was all to find Ruben Truth’s formula for playing god. This man wants that power, thinks Sgt Thomas. It is evident in his manner as he shouts into the handset, and how he digs away at the flesh of the tree, and when he follows the faint trail that remains of the ruined roads to the destroyed church where only little over an hour before the whole thing had, literally sprouted. Digging around in the newly turned soil, the man pulls out a chunk of red-coated cement. Blood.
Sergeant Thomas feels a small stab of panic, but doesn’t know why, and immediately tightens his grip on his weapon. The civilian lets out a cry of obvious joy and pulls a small syringe from his pocket, squirting a few drops of clear liquid onto the surface of the rock before drawing it back up into the tube, now quite saturated with blood. Then, with obvious glee, then man reaches down and pulls another container from his pack. Inside is a small insect making a chirruping noise: a cricket. The insect looks strange, covered in a sort of powder.
The stab of panic becomes a white-hot flame of anger as Bill Thomas sees, for one brief second, the future. He sees himself not moving while the civilian man squeezes one drop of blood-infused chemical over the body of the insect and they all watch as it multiplies thousands and thousands of times to dominate its surroundings, just as these gallant oaks had done not long ago.
On one hand, a miracle – on the other, a plague.
Bill steps back to the present for a moment, and feels his trigger finger depress calmly and the weapon buck slightly as the bullets track upwards from the stranger’s stomach to his neck. The plastic container holding the cricket drops to the forest floor and is cradled in the soft black earth, recently overturned.
As one, the other members of Sergeant Thomas’ squad turn to look at him, each with their weapons smoking, each amazed at the lack of surprise on each other faces as they see that each one of them has simultaneously emptied their magazines into the body of the civilian. As one they turn away from the body and re-sling their rifles over their shoulders after reloading them.
In single file behind Sgt Thomas – now just Bill – they walk over the ruins of the church in the direction of the river.
Behind them, from the lake, a fine mist descends upon the city like a cloud.
Chapter Seventeen – The Journey Begins
Rachel
Rachel Truth walks. She alternates carrying Gwyn and Jewel on her back. After nearly twenty miles of walking north, she turns eastward to follow a paved road, hoping to find someone that will give them some food and water.
Soon both children are beyond their normal levels of exhaustion, and Rachel has to stop. She moves off from the road a little ways and flattens an area of green grass to rest in. The children immediately fall asleep, cuddling with each other much as they were last night. Rachel keeps a silent watch, wondering whether she would have the energy to make it to Jonah’s parents’ old place.
She knows that he will try to go there, although she can’t be certain that he won’t try to find them at their own house first. She hopes not. She has a bad feeling about what was about to happen to the world, as if it has been turned upside down.
All the things we rely upon are being taken away, she thinks to herself.
A car approaches on the road, travelling east. Rachel freezes for a moment, torn between an urge to hide and the need to get food. She ducks her head down as the car crests a low rise and comes into view. It is travelling fairly slowly, probably trying to conserve fuel. She lays down flat in the grass, using her body to hide the children from view.
The car stops and two men get out. Through the grass, Rachel can see them go to the front of the car and open the hood. Steam is rolling off the engine. She turns slightly, struggling to remain silent while manoeuvring her body into a position where she can see the men more clearly. They seem to be completely absorbed by their attempts to repair the vehicle.
She feels movement behind her, and two small hands on her back. Gwyn stands up and calls out at the top of his lungs, “Want my bottle!”
Immediately the two men swing their heads over to the family lying in the grass.
“Mummy, I want my bottle,” Gwyn says again, a little quieter now.
The men start to walk towards Rachel and the children. Rachel stands and tries to place herself in front of Gwyn, but the little boy playfully ducks around her knee and tries to run towards the men. He falls flat on his face as he trips over a clump of grass and begins to cry. Behind Rachel, Jewel raises her head and also starts to cry, frightened from awakening so suddenly in a strange place.
“We don’t want no trouble,” says the nearest, a large brown-haired fellow. He is wearing a red flannel shirt and a battered ball-cap. “We’re just trying to get our car started, is all, and we ain’t got any water.” He winces as both children erupt in fresh bouts of tears when their mother does not react to them quickly enough.
Rachel, ignoring the men, picks up Gwyn, and holding him on her hip, takes hold of Jewel’s arm with the same hand. Then, turning to face the two now-sheepish looking men, she holds a water bottle to Gwyn’s lips, allowing him to take a long drink. “We don’t have any water to spare,” she says. “You boys should probably head down the hill to the creek and get some there. And next time think about what you’re doing, instead of sneaking up on sleeping children.”
Gwyn, reacting to his mother’s tone of voice, points his finger at the nearest man and says vehemently, “You naughty boy!”
The first man winces and the one behind him gives a laugh, until the other turns his head at him with a scowl. They both head silently back to the car. One slams the hood down and the other pushes from behind. The car rolls slowly on its way forward, picking up a bit of speed as they turn it around and coast back down the long hill.
Rachel slides Jonah’s fish filleting knife out of it
s leather sheath in her waistband and looks at it. She feels foolish for letting herself be caught with both hands occupied. Without further hesitation she slides the knife back and picks up their few belongings. She continues walking, carrying the children, along the east road until they reach a gateway to a farmer’s field. She takes the children through the gate carefully, trying not to show any signs of their passing. Her faith in friendly travellers on the road having run thin, she keeps the knife close to hand.
…
Jonah
I feel my way forward in the blackness of the tunnel. The stink of so many sweaty people in a confined space begins to build up in my nostrils. As a group we grope in the darkness with no sense of our direction.
There are rumblings from above, and some dirt trickles down from the tunnel ceiling to the bare earth floor, but there is no evidence of collapse. We wouldn’t be able to see it anyway. It seems that darkness is our new destiny, and I am nearly resigned to this fact when a shaft of light appears from in front of us, throwing our shadows behind us as we turn our heads from the sudden brightness. We are in a tomb, or rather some kind of large underground crypt.
The cracks of light grow brighter as I push past everyone to the front, where Herb and Steven have held anyone from attempting to go any further. Their shadowy outlines are my only greeting; they both stand wordless beside a large stone door as I approach.
“Any idea where this leads?” I ask.
Steven crosses his arms, “Well, we were thinking you could be the one to tell us about that.”
I walk up to the door and give a slight push. Nothing. “I was hoping it would lead us up,” I say as I run my hands over the smooth surface. “And out.”
The door is completely featureless, with no hinges or handle to speak of. Not for the first time I feel a stab of panic. I can’t help thinking that this dark tunnel crypt will indeed be our tomb. It seems to be a human mind trick we play on ourselves: imagining the worst possible scenario, and then unconsciously refusing to ignore it. The darkness brings nothing but flashes of what we would look like hundreds of years from now, when our bodies are uncovered when someone excavates this ground to build a new skyscraper.
I shake my head a few times, trying to clear my thoughts. The crack of light grows a little bigger as the block of stone that must be the door shudders with an impact.
I reach my fingers around the end of the stone and pull with all my dwindling strength, and the whole slab starts to lean towards me. I quickly reverse my grip and start to push back with my shoulders firmly braced and my feet scrambling for purchase on the cement floor.
“Wait!” I call out to whoever is on the other side – the outside. “Stop pushing for a minute!” And then to Herb, Steve and the others who have started to crowd around the shaft of light, “Get back, everyone, I can’t hold it!”
Slowly, inexorably slowly, the giant cement slab slips backward as I bend lower, straining to release this weight from my back. The only vision I can see in my sparkled mind is the image of a giant hand of death pushing this monster rock onto me and killing me with its weight. But then the vision stops. Icy fear fades as I realize that I cannot hold this rock from falling. I don’t have the strength to reverse its slow momentum downwards as my knees sink closer and closer to the ground.
I slip. The stone falls. I try to roll sideways out of its path, but the tip of the long knife, the one I pulled from the door at the other end of the tunnel, the one I stuck in my belt, catches in a crack in the floor. Face down, I cover my head with hands and I feel the unforgiving weight of the door press against my left foot.
And then there is nothing but darkness.
…
Herb
We watch in horror as Jonah Truth tries to hold back the weight of the stone door. The people behind Steven and I are screaming as they fall over each other to escape. I am frozen in place about ten feet back. The light blinds me, but I can’t cover my eyes. The pain in my heart is immediate. It’s as if I have seen hope itself killed in front of my eyes as the door smashed to the ground and broke into a hundred smaller pieces.
With glorious daylight shining through the dust, my tear-filled eyes try to make sense of the scene. Steven and I dive forward and start throwing chunks of rock aside.
“He’s here, I’ve got him,” Steven says beside me, sounding oddly calm.
On my knees, wiping my eyes on my sleeve, I raise my head. There before me is a sight I can’t imagine ever forgetting. A long silver cross shines, appearing almost to glow with its own incandescence, in the beams of the light that sweep diagonally down through the dust of the tunnel.
Lying prostate beside the cross, which I can see now is actually a long silver blade driven into the stone floor, is Jonah Truth. He is not moving, although his body seems to rise and fall with the effort of breathing.
“Come on,” says Steven, urging me up. “Grab his legs.”
We pull Jonah out of the pile of smashed rocks and debris that surround and cover him. Two more pairs of hands help, grabbing pant legs and shirt sleeves, as Amy and Susan approach. We get him out of the hulking emptiness of the open doorway and carry him up an earthen ramp-way to ground level. The ground is muddy, and we try not to jostle Jonah too much, slipping several times before we reach the grass of the graveyard that lies outside of the tunnel.
We lay him down gently on the grass. He appears to breathe, and he doesn’t seem to be bleeding anywhere except a slight oozing from the cuts on his hands, but he does not stir. We kneel beside him, Steven, Amy, Susan, and me. We four who do not know what the effect is that this man has had on us, but we don’t seem to be ready to let him go, or to go on without him.
A line of people continue to make their way out of the tunnel. Slowly, almost reverently, they pass in single file before moving on in groups to talk quietly among themselves.
I guess at nearly two-thousand people passing by us before the groups begin to finally disperse. Some stare at the new forest that has appeared to accompany the tall buildings farther off across the river in their loneliness, and even small trees that are growing on this side of the water, only a hundred yards away. Some glance from the tunnel to Jonah’s body and our little tableau beside him a few times before turning away.
Eventually, in small groups, they walk northward out of the graveyard and up towards the main road.
No one speaks, at least not in a voice that I can hear.
Some time later, the four of us rise. We turn as one at the sound of a voice behind us.
“It just doesn’t seem right.” It is the elderly minister, her filthy robes draped over her tiny frame, giving her an odd look of condensed vitality and puissance. “To see such a brave effort wasted.”
She climbs up the slope out of the tunnel with surprising ease, and comes over to us. Pushing me aside almost tenderly with her right hand, she reaches down with her left and shakes Jonah gently by the shoulder.
“Wake up,” she says quietly, as if addressing a child. “Open your eyes.”
For a moment nothing happens. Steven and I look at each other for a second, wondering, and Susan puts her arm around Amy.
And then Jonah Truth opens his eyes.
…
Jonah
The pain. The pain. The pain. There is no feeling... only pain. The needles of it are blunt and splintered sticks driving themselves through my very bones. The realization that I am in pain, and not, in fact, dead, is not a comfort.
The pain only serves to wake me from a peaceful, if somewhat lonely, slumber.
I hear the sound of a low moan grumble from deep within the bowels of my lungs to hiss through the edges of my teeth and sound something like a breath as the air seeps into the outer universe of the world.
A blink of the eye – from somewhat closed to somewhat open – and a dazzle of lights sends my head reeling in a nauseating spin of vertigo. I almost glimpse the leaves of a treetop, swaying over me.
I settle my mind within that image
. I imagine those trees, the great, giant oaks growing bigger and taller with roots growing tougher and deeper over months and years and decades. Until they touch the underground fingers of another tree, maybe a maple this time, or a copse of cedars, who spread the message of the oak’s discovery. The not-dead man lies in a partial shade under my branches. Soon my leaves will spread and he will be completely cloaked by my presence. The cedars might tell the beach tree, and the beach might have its privacy stolen away by a stand of hemlock, who rub against a straight balsam in the breeze. The sound might carry to a lone pine on a rocky hill, struggling to stay connected to the pattern as it clings to its sparse sustenance with the acidic soil it has learned to appear to thrive on.
And Rachel might see that tree. She might sit on the stump of the dead elm that we cut down last winter and took two months to burn in the fireplace. She might sit on that stump and listen to the breeze blow through those harsh needles and hear the soft message of truth.
I am not quite dead. And because of the growing half-shadow of a tree-branch over my head, I acknowledge the pain and open my eyes.
I vomit on Steven’s shoes. I know this from the curse that forms his reaction. I don’t see anything, feel anything, know anything, but pain.
And a little bit of hope.
…
Herb
We fashion a kind of a litter for Jonah out of a pair of oak saplings that have managed to sprout on this side of the river and a couple of coats stitched together with Jonah’s shoelaces.
The forest grows as we work, although it appears to have slowed somewhat from its initial frenzy of expansion. It takes Steven a few minutes to get over his cussing spell and for the old lady to pretend she doesn’t hear him. The shadows grow sideways and reach out across the river to touch us before we slide Jonah onto the makeshift stretcher and drag him out of the cemetery and away from this place.
