Flare (48 page)

We need to find the source of this river,
and then we’ll descend into the caves to which it flows.

/***/

The river came from a waterfall, softly pouring over terraced steps before crashing to the ground thirty feet below. The trees were unusually thick here, with roots that crisscrossed the earth and leaves that spread across the sky. This forest was more alive than any Zeke had seen before. It didn’t hold the ashen skeletons of trees killed by the flare, but rather living trees that reached up to take in the daylight without fear.

Zeke put his hands in the water glistening in the faint moonlight, and it was cool to the touch. The river looked as if it came from a stream far off, and Zeke guessed that the water had been sterilized in the sun and then kept moving until it reached his fingers. Zeke couldn’t resist, and cupped some water to his mouth. It tasted clean, like rocks and rain. He looked to his left and saw that Courtney and the fox were drinking from the stream as well.

The rocks formed steps that went down the waterfall, and Zeke traversed them carefully. It got dark as he traveled below, and there were plenty of animals scurrying about. Two deer and a wolf passed him on the way down, brushing by his hip and treading through the darkness confidently, needing no light to navigate the stony path.

Zeke noticed that Courtney had not come down with him, and only he and the fox were descending into the darkness. Zeke reached the bottom of the waterfall and realized that there were more levels below, and he took a thick battery-powered flashlight from his coat and turned it on. He saw that the water trickled another hundred feet over rocks, and there were more terraced steps to take him further down.

Courtney came to meet him minutes later with an armful of wood, both thick sticks and wiry kindling.

“We should make a fire here,” said Courtney.

/***/

It was tough starting the fire because the kindling was slightly damp, but the wet sticks eventually smoldered, and the fire caught shortly thereafter. Zeke noticed that there were even plants on the walls that yielded fruit. Many of the animals were mingling about them on this level, and a few were nibbling on the pods from the walls. Zeke took a fruit from a hanging vine and noticed that its shell was thinner than the shells they had seen on the surface. Zeke examined its outer casing and noticed that it was green, with a curvy shape like that of a vase. He showed it to Courtney and she sniffed it, cracked the shell open and then took a small taste of what was inside.

“It’s a gourd,” she said. “The really bitter-tasting ones can be a little poisonous, but these aren’t bitter. If we just take the young green ones off the vine, we should be good.”

They roasted the young gourds in a pan over the fire, and the meal gave off a warm, inviting aroma. Zeke could see the smoke rising from the flame and escaping into the sky above, but didn’t worry about it doing so. There were no enemies that would find their position from the light of the campfire, and there were no predatory animals to approach them because of the scent. All the animals he had seen so far were gentle, perhaps cowed and humbled by the flare, but calm and mild nonetheless. He didn’t fear the deer, the wolves or the now-feral dogs that shared their space. He wondered if there were still bears around, and if so, what their mood would be like.

Everything is smaller and softer here.
These creatures are slighter in stature, and they don’t spend their days killing and eating each other. If they did so, soon there would be none of them left. Instead of killing each other they eat what the world gives them freely, and nothing more.

“I think we should explore the floor below,” said Courtney. “The sun should be coming up soon, and I have a strange thought.”

They traveled down the steps, which were surprisingly navigable. As they walked they saw not just darkness, but a green faerie light coming from the ground beneath. They reached the floor and the caverns were somehow illuminated, the walls and water both giving off a strong glow. Courtney started another fire and the world around them sparkled in response, pulsing with a soft light. Zeke noticed that the walls had thin, glowing strips that moved, and some patches of the water shone more brightly than others.

“Bioluminescence,” said Courtney. “I don’t know how, or why, but many creatures in this cave give light.”

Zeke saw that though the light was soft, the cave was evenly lit, and he could see in all directions. Each area shone a different color, and each pulsed its light at a different frequency, but the creatures in aggregate illuminated the room at all times.
It’s beautiful.
It’s as if the world had so much light to spare it left a little down here, just for us.

Zeke saw that tunnels spread out in all directions, and the animals moved freely about through the passageways.

“Let’s set our tent tonight,” said Courtney. “My strange thought can wait until tomorrow.”

/***/

The next morning, both Courtney and the fox were gone. Zeke woke in darkness inside the tent and wondered where they went. His eyes adjusted and saw that there was a faint light coming from a jar of glowing water that Courtney had procured the night before. Zeke used it as a flashlight, and then located a jar of clean water and drank it. He recognized the taste as the water that they had found upstream near the waterfall, clean water that had not yet been mixed with the water on their level that gave them glowing light.

“Come outside,” Zeke heard Courtney say.

Zeke thought it odd that she was outside, but noticed that she didn’t seem under any duress.

“It’s okay,” she said. “You’ve got to see this.”

Zeke went to open his tent, and instinctively looked away and closed his eyes as he opened it a crack. The tent flooded with light, but he waited a moment and noticed that his skin didn’t hurt. It was still bright, but nothing hurt.

He opened his eyes and looked towards the opposite wall of the tent. Light was blasting the inside of the tent, but it was tolerable. He picked the sunglasses from his pocket and put them on, and the world darkened perfectly. He turned around to see the shadow of Courtney set against a blown-out white background, and then he heard her open the tent further. She leaned in and he saw her face, with her body still drenched in white, as if she were coming down from heaven.

“Come out,” she said. “Please, come out.”

Zeke got out of the tent and it was bright, too bright to see the nuances of colors, but bearable and still soft on his skin. He felt a nudge at his legs and looked down to see the fox. He then looked over to see the water, iridescent and shimmering in the sun, absorbing the radiation so it could return the light after night fell.

“There are clouds in the sky here,” said Courtney. “A lot of them. They cut out most of the light, and the trees cut out more with their canopies. The vines on the ground cut out even more, and if you’re down here, you can take in the day.”

Zeke smiled and looked around at his new home. There was space down here in this cave, space enough to build a shelter using the trees above. There was water, shimmering and clean at the top and glowing at the bottom. There was plenty of food, with fruits growing on vines and out of roots everywhere they looked. There was arable farm land down in these caves too, small patches here and there filled with loamy soil where they could grow what they wished. They could build shelters on the top to grow crops too, perhaps start with what grew naturally here and experiment over time.

They could live with the animals as well, not raising them to bring to slaughter, but live
with
them. They would be part of these creatures’ herd, not above or below them, but part of them. The creatures were easy to live with and shared what they needed without taking too much. Zeke hadn’t seen a single set of animals fight each other, let alone prey upon one another.

There are no lions here to lay down with calves,
but there are wolves here and they live with the deer. This is where we will start our new life. I don’t quite know how it works; I don’t know how the wolves eat only fruit, but they do, and this is the place that I have sought.

Zeke would build a shelter for the children and a classroom. He would then wander back to the school, board up the school bus’s windows, and bring the kids back here. He would let Courtney instruct them while he built shelters for crops. After they were situated and safe, he would wander out again. That’s what he was put on this earth to do. To
wander.

He wouldn’t leave this place though, because it was now his home. He would wander and gather people to bring them back here, but only the right people. He wouldn’t bring the hardened, the vicious and the cruel. He wouldn’t bring back demons, nor would he bring back rough men, even if they would promise to defend this place. If he brought the right people, this place would need no defending.

This was a place for the meek. He would bring the crippled, the ugly and the defeated. He would bring the soft and the kind, the teachers and the healers, the old and the toothless. He could bring back a wolf, but only if it was a wolf that could lie down with lambs. This was the place to start over, to create new rules for this world, ones that relied on the soft fruits that miraculously grew in the sun, and not the hard truths that claimed nothing would ever be able to grow again.

This is the Peaceable Kingdom that will launch a new way of life,
and it will remain at peace.

Courtney beckoned Zeke over, and she pointed to the sky. The light was overpowering at first, but Zeke’s eyes adjusted again, and he could see. He could see the vines crisscrossing the holes above, and he could see the trees letting thin strips of light through their spread canopy. The fox looked up with them and Zeke started to smile, and then laugh, and Courtney soon joined him.

“It’s the sun, at noon,” she said. “
And it’s beautiful
.”

THE END

Photo courtesy of Dustin Hamano
 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jonathan Maas is a writer living in Los Angeles. He writes during his bus ride to and from work, and owes much of this novel to the traffic on the 405. He is a fan of all types of literature, with his favorite writers being Cormac McCarthy, Sherman Alexie, Bernard Malamud, Tom Wolfe, and Stephen King.

Other works by Jonathan Maas:
City of Gods –
Hellenica
Spanners
– The Fountain of Youth

This story/concept was made in conjunction with the filmmaker David C. Keith

This book is edited by Patty Smith. You can find her at
www.foolproofcopyedit.com

The cover art is courtesy of Manthos Lappas
and LNC Art Studios

Cover design is by Jonathan Maas and Danny Rapaport