A Cold Black Wave (9 page)

“He uh, he took me by the hand and we left our house and by then I knew something terrible was happening.  He led me out and then that’s when the alarms started going off, and I-I asked him what was going on, where he was taking me. He didn’t say anything, just kept running and pulling me and telling me to keep up.  I was scared and I tried to get him to stop because I had no idea what was happening.  Then there was an explosion and it knocked us down.  The air was filled with smoke and I couldn’t see, but I felt him taking me by the hand again and then we were in this hangar that I never saw before.  Then I saw the shuttles and uh, that’s when I realized we were leaving the Westbound and I panicked because where else would we go?  What else is there but the Westbound, you know?

“I never even considered that he wasn’t coming with me.  I couldn’t imagine it, so, I just figured because he was on the council they got some special treatment which is why we were going on these shuttles.  Then we stopped at the door to one of them, and he held me, he just hugged me and told me, told me that he loved me and that God would always take care of me.”

She broke down and wept, trying to keep herself together as she retraced those final moments in detail for the first time since they had left.  Josh patiently waited.

Leah wiped her face and sniffled. “He gave me my book, the book I treasure more than anything now, and ... my whole body just, it just shook and I couldn’t move, I couldn’t think.  He opened the door and that’s when he was attacked from behind.  He must’ve been so weak but he, he fought the man and yelled for me to get inside and I did.  I just panicked and ran inside and hid.  All I could hear were his screams, he ...” she hid her face and cried bitterly.

Josh didn’t know what to say, and tried, but then stopped himself when he realized his words would mean nothing for her.  Instead, he put his hand on her leg and ran it gently back and forth, unsure if that was even the right thing to do.  She was so heartbroken and lost at that moment, and the feeling was familiar to him and he thought he should be doing something more.  He knew that nothing could be done.  There are no words or deeds that can match the void in the heart created from death.  There is only time and acceptance, neither of which completely erases the pain.

Instead, she leaned softly next to him to be closer and her tears dripped off her cheeks and onto his forearm.  He let her cry and just held her and brushed her hair back.  He had never touched a girl like this before in his life, and here in this bleak place a warm sense of relief came from the catharsis they were now both experiencing.

Finally Leah’s cries subsided.  She sat back and peeked at him while she tried to dry her face, worried what he might think of her. “I’m sorry.  I probably look horrible right now.”

She looked beautiful, a stark realization that took him by surprise all at once and in that moment turned slow and capturing, like a thousand pictures being taken within every passing second.  The cold resolutions of survival and the calculations against empathy had shattered in a thousand refracted pieces that left only the image of her wet, melancholy eyes, devoid of malice and left vulnerable to him.

He stammered as he slid away from her. “Look, uh, I didn’t, I mean I really, I haven’t treated you that great, and I’m really sorry about your father.”

She nodded slightly, still running her fingers under her eyes.

He continued, “I am, it’s just ... the academy, Leah, you have no idea what they did to us.  I regret being who I am sometimes because this isn’t me; it’s what the academy wanted us to be.  We were raised from a young age to believe only one thing mattered, that we had a destiny to fulfill. A glorious rediscovery of mankind, building upon the virginal land of a new world.”

“Why couldn’t you leave?”

“Nobody leaves the academy unless you lose your mind or one of your classmates kills you in a scenario.”

“Scenario?”

Josh turned melancholy. “We were often put into scenarios which were based on realistic situations we may encounter.  See, back on earth, they tried to govern the rules of war and balance the brutality with the civility.  The Academy no longer had a need for that because if we don’t survive, all of mankind disappears forever.  So, we were allowed to kill in these scenarios.  It heightened the senses, calloused the heart ... forced those who would tremble at the idea of killing someone to tap into their primal bloodlust in order to survive.”

Leah could see his mind retreat from his very pupils as he spoke and she inched closer to him, “Josh?  Did you kill someone?”

He didn’t respond to her question almost as if he hadn’t heard it, his train of thought rapidly flipping through vivid memories of his life at the Academy.  “I’ve said enough, I think.”  Then he continued after some thought, “Just didn’t think it would be like this, just me and ...”

“Some dumb Greenyard girl?”  She said with crooked smile.

He smirked, “Yeah!  Something like that.  You saved my life.  That amounts to something.”

“You saved mine,” she said softly with coy adoration.  They shared a brief moment as their eyes watched each other but then Leah, feeling butterflies said quickly, “You blew that thing away pretty good!  I chopped its head off by the way.”

“You did what?”  Josh asked unbelievingly.  “Where’d you put it?”

“It’s still out there, he’s all yours captain.”

“I wish I could but we need to get going.  We do,” he added emphatically after seeing the surprised look on her face.

“Seriously Josh, in your condition?  You barely have the energy to stand.  Listen to the doctor.”

“You’re a doctor?”

“Well, no, but it sounded good.  Please.  At least give yourself until the morning.  You need to eat.  A lot.  You look like a skeleton.”

He sighed.  He knew she was right and didn’t fight her, “Ok.”  He paused in thought.  His mind ran through percentages and probabilities against his own general consciousness of his body’s capabilities and decided they could stay awhile longer.  He did need the rest and even though tomorrow would be excruciatingly difficult for him, it was the best course of action.  “Ok.  We leave first thing in the morning though.  We’ll go through the packing tonight.  There’s not much we can take so we have to make it count, plus I need to see what you can carry without toppling over.”

“Hey!”  She punched his arm lightly, “I’m tougher than you think.”

He had sobered up from his unexpected emotional detour and replied with his usual deadpan concern, “I hope so.”

The next morning
they ate a large breakfast and hauled their packs out and set them next to the shuttle.  Again the day was beautiful and cold, but not unbearably so.  It wouldn’t take long for them to heat up under their thick clothing as the sun beat down on them.  Josh spent time double checking their packs and doing inventory in the supply room to ensure nothing critical was left behind.

In Josh’s weakened state, it would be impossible for them to carry much more than
food and water
.  They would strike out blindly now with no idea how long they would be traveling or what they would possibly run into.  The entire morning he didn’t say more than a few words as the prospect of their survival rested front and center on his mind.

Had they landed somewhere a little warmer, somewhere they were not under immediate threat, Josh would have started bu
ilding a permanent camp
around the shuttle.  This was the intent of the shuttle’s design, and the mission, to establish a self-sufficient colony wherever they landed.  Reducing their available supplies to two backpacks was risky, and significantly decreased their odds of survival, but it was better than the odds of facing another machine in the dead of winter and cornered inside the shuttle.  Josh hoped they could forage on the way or make contact with someone or something that wasn’t trying to kill them.

“You need to wear these where we’re going,” he said, handing her a pair of snowshoes.  She held the strange footwear up to examine them before sitting down on the edge of the shuttle to try and fit them on.  After fumbling with the straps for awhile he finally came over to help her, “Here, like this.”

She admired his ability to attach them both with relative ease, watching him work with that fiery resolve that impressed her.  Even at the Greenyard people never worked with such intensity and singularity as Josh did.  When he was finished he caught her staring again and quickly turned away, his mind too weighted down by their imminent departure to consider her intentions.

“So where are we going, anyway?”  She asked, sticking both legs out in front of her to examine her new shoes.

He tightened the straps on his pack, “South.  It’s the only way out of this valley without taking us through these mountains.”  The mountains were indeed steep and ominous, covered in deep snow that would be impossible for them to cross in their current state.

“Then what?  How far are we going?”

He hoisted his heavy pack onto his shoulders and winced from a sharp pain in his stomach and waited for it to pass before answering, “I don’t know.  We need to get to the foothills at least, out of this snow.  Let’s get going.”  He looked at her pack, “Need help with that?”

“No,” she said, putting on her own pack which was roughly half the size of his but just as heavy for her.  “Lead the way captain.”

He was about to ask why she kept calling him that but decided it didn’t matter, instead thinking it as some name of endearment she developed towards him.  He liked to think of it that way.

They hiked for an hour without saying a word, focused entirely on their environment and the burden
of
their trek.  Tromping through the thick snow with heavy packs, even with the snowshoes, was laborious for both of them and especially for Josh whose body shivered in bouts of lingering illness.

Finally it was Josh who found an alcove under silvery quartz and granite outcropping that leaked water from somewhere far above.  He set his pack down and sat on a helmet shaped rock to rest.  Leah followed suit, also exhausted and thankful he was the first to decide on resting.

They shared a water bottle and caught their breath as the morning sun pierced through the swaying trees and lit patches of earth near their feet and along the glistening quartz rock.  It was serene there with the soft running water chasing itself down the craggy rocks and dripping at intervals onto the forest floor.  They lost themselves in similar thoughts, accepting the moment and drifting into their own long-held dream of living on earth when it was still vibrant and alive.  It was hard to imagine anything else.

“You okay?”  Josh finally asked as he readied his pack.

“I was waiting for you.”

As they traveled further the forest began to thin, swathes of shade giving way to pockets of sunlight that broke through the trees.  The gully Josh had run into days ago had found its way back into their path, except this time they could follow alongside it instead of having to cross over.  The nightmare of his encounter with the machine felt almost unreal to him now, just a hypnagogic aberration he experienced during his feverish nights.  He nervously watched for movement on the other side of the gully.

Their next break came after forty minutes of hiking, then the next at thirty as the strength in their bodies waned.  The midday sun hovered above and a cold front moved in that rapidly chilled the air yet they found the inside of their parka moist with sweat.

Leah stopped and scooped up a handful of wet snow and clumped it together, "Hey!"

Josh turned, "Wh-?”  The ball of ice smacked him square in the nose.
 
He stood there, stunned maybe, or trying to hold back his anger
 
at her for
 
being so childish.  Then he slowly bent over and padded a baseball-sized lump of snow and cupped it in his right hand.

"No!"
 
She put her hands up, "Don't you dare!"
 
She tried ducking away and squealed
 
just before
 
it exploded against the side of her head.
 
Wet ice stuck to her hair and dripped
 
freezing down her neck and under her parka.
 
She laughed as her body tensed from the cold ice, and reached down her coat to retrieve the melting snow before it slid further but not before another snowball pelted her.
 
Josh stood there with a smirk on his face and she tried running at him with a handful of snow, but with the snowshoes and the heavy pack
 
it was just a comic, slow-motion gait.

"Sure, come on," he taunted as she slowly made her way to him, "I don’t got all day!"
 
Wobbling a few feet away she cocked her arm back and pretended to throw and he ducked, then she dove into him and they both collapsed to the snow as she laughed and rubbed a handful into his face.

"Ow!
 
Ow!
 
Stop!"
 
He yelled, rolling away as he held his stomach.

She shot up, "Oh my God, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean-"

W
ith his hand hidden under his leg, he grabbed a ball of snow and pressed it in her face like a pie.  She fell back laughing so hard she couldn’t breathe and Josh couldn’t hold back the huge smile on his face.  But
 
as she sat up, a report crackled through the air and was so shockingly loud they both immediately flattened to the snow to take cover.  Josh scanned their surroundings from their position, "What the fuck was that?”

She shook her head in wild-eyed terror. 

“You okay?”  He asked, his eyes searching her for a sign of blood.

"I-I think so.
 
I don't feel anything, maybe I'm in shock."

Then he noticed something and she saw the worry on his face.  “Christ, Leah, don’t move.”

“What?”  Her face drained of color.  Did Josh see someone?

They both had slung their rifles over their shoulder and connected the base of the barrel to a small clip that sat alongside their backpack, preventing them from having to hold the strap the entire time to keep the gun from sliding off.  Now as she lay face down the barrel of her gun was pointed directly at Josh.  A metal buckle on one of her dangling straps had lodged itself between the trigger and any sudden movement would put pressure on it and fire a bullet into his head.

“I’m going to roll away, don’t move a muscle.  Got it?”

“What?”  She unconsciously shifted her weight and the buckle pressed ever more against the trigger, a hair’s width away from firing it.

“Stop!”  He cried as he tried to roll away.  The gun fired again and she cried out in horror and dropped her face, unable to look.

The gunshot echo disappeared and left a calm silence in its wake.  She remained frozen, terrified of what she would see if she looked up. 

“Ok, you're fine, sit up.”  He sighed in frustration, suddenly next to her. “Next time use the safety."
 
He flipped it on for her.

"Sorry," she whimpered.
 
She had never handled a gun before and didn't even know guns had a safety.

“Ok,” he decided.  “Give me the gun.”

“Here, take it, I don’t ever want one again.”

“Wrong answer.  You need to learn how to use it.  This is a crash course and you got one shot.  No pressure, right?”

“Um, sure,” she said as she pulled the strap over her head to hand the rifle over.

“See this?  This is the trigger.  Do not pull it when you fire. Squeeze it.  Slow steady pressure.  You slam down on it and it’s going to screw your aim up.  Which brings me to the next part.  Stick it against your shoulder like this,” he pressed the butt end against the inside of his shoulder.  “Grip with both hands and aim down the barrel.  Now you do it.”

He handed it to her, double checking the safety just in case, and then prodded her to follow instructions, “Go ahead.  It’s safe, it won’t fire.  Bring it up ... yep, just like that.  See that little thing at the end of the barrel?  That’s your sight.  Aim down the barrel and as you do, make sure the sight at the end of the barrel lines up directly in the notch here.  If you don’t line those up correctly you might as well be firing from the hip.”

“The hip?  Why would-”

“Here,” he took the gun back again and held it in both hands at hip-level.  “See?  You shoot like this and you aren’t hittin’ anything.  Hey,” he cautioned.  “Pay attention.  This is the first thing you’ll do if you panic so I’m tellin’ you right now, don’t.  Take the time to aim.”

He handed it back to her, “Aim for that pinecone up there, sitting on that rock.  See it?”  She nodded.  “Kneel like this with one knee down and the other up, and rest your right elbow on your knee to steady yourself.  If you ever have to lay down to steady your aim you can use anything, a rock, a dead body, whatever is handy to rest it on.”

She glanced at him like he was crazy.  Rest it on a dead body?  She’d be lucky enough to not faint from shock if she was that close to a corpse.  The last thing she’d be thinking of is how to properly rest a rifle on top of someone’s dead face.

Unsure of herself handling what felt like a rocket launcher apt to fire at any moment, she did as he instructed.

“Take your time, don’t rush it.”  He said, eager to teach her something and confident in his ability to instruct her.  “And one final thing.  Once you have the sights aligned, slowly breathe out right before you squeeze the trigger.  Got it?  Exhale, squeeze.”

“Those old movies made it look a lot easier.  Sure I gotta do all this?”

He reiterated calmly, “Exhale.  Squeeze.  Forget the movies.”

She got into position and rested her elbow, holding the rifle straight and taking time to align the sights as he had instructed.  Her body seemed to pulse every second and dance the sight around, or maybe her hands were shaking at anticipation of the report but it became more difficult to keep it steady with each passing moment.

“Well are you-”

“Hey!” She said as she shot a glance at him.  “I was about to fire and you screwed me all up.”

“We don’t got all day!”

“Give me a break I want to get this right.”  She wiped her forehead and shook her right arm out and repositioned herself.  This time she lined up the sights and didn’t wait, exhaling and slowly squeezing the-