A Cold Black Wave (19 page)

“What the hell is going on?”  His heavy eyes danced back and forth between it and Knicte.

“He’s dead ...” she said, her voice dry and distant. 

“Are you okay?  Are there other machines?  Leah?”

She shook her head.

“Are you hurt?”

“No!”

He winced in pain as he slid next to her and put her shaking hands in his and said hoarsely, “Its okay, its fine, just breathe.”

“There isn’t ...”

“What?”

“There are no other people,” she said blankly.  “They’re all dead.  We’re alone.  We’ve been abandoned here ...”

“You don’t know that.  Look at me.  You don’t know that.”

She raised her head her eyes were defeated, questioning, a look that he had never seen in her before. “Why would God do this to us?”

“You can’t think like that,” he said.  “Focus on this, us,” he said as he squeezed her arms, “because we’re here and we have no choice but to move forward.  And we will Leah.  We will.  Okay?”

“I can’t take this anymore ... I can’t ...” she held her head and sobbed.  Josh cupped her face and lifted it until she was forced to look into his eyes, “Please.  Focus on me.”  She did.  Her green eyes were red rimmed and splashed with tears.  They plead with him for deliverance from this place, from the emptiness that was filling her but he couldn’t because he felt the same way and knew she saw it in him too.  She also saw how deeply he cared for her and in that moment, that was all that mattered.

She kissed him.  She kissed him and held his face and pressed it against hers and felt how real and good it was.

Josh pulled her into his arms and held her so close he could feel her heart pounding against his chest.  She let everything go and cried on his shoulder until she felt nothing.  Josh let her cry and enjoyed the warmth of her embrace, the feeling of her body given fully to his.

Finally he pulled away and brushed her hair back.

“Josh,” she said, staring at the ground.  “What are we going to do?”

“We’ll find others Leah.  They’re out there somewhere and we’ll find them.  I promise.”

“And if we don’t?”

He wanted to say what they both were thinking, but held back.  “I don’t know.  Let’s figure one thing out at a time alright?”

"Back at the stream.  You thought I was going to die, didn’t you?”

His faced turned grim as he recalled that dark night.  “You had
 
the virus,” he said somberly.  “It wasn't just a cold or a flu that you
 
came down with,
 
Leah.
 
People, people who spent their lives working on diseases and vaccines and studying every strain that was ever inflicted upon man, and they couldn’t stop it.  You were immune or you weren’t.  That was it.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

He kept one hand gently cupping her neck, rubbing his thumb across her cheek, “You were still so happy, you believed everything was going to be okay even when I knew it wasn’t.  In some way I really wanted to believe you, and I couldn’t bring myself to take that hope away.”

“How did you feel, about, about me dying ...?”

He stumbled when he tried to tell her what he had nearly done that night, and chose to hide the truth from her.  That part of it anyway.  “All I knew was that without you, I was lost.  I had to imagine you being gone and being left alone.  I imagined being the last person alive and that death would be better than being without you.”

Her eyes welled up and she hugged him with all the love and energy she had in her, because she felt the same way about him.  Somehow they were condemned to this place where they could barely struggle to survive, and all they wanted was the peace and love of a life together away from all of this.

Josh pulled away suddenly.

“What’s the matter?”

He looked down to his wound and winced, “Still hurts.”

“How’s your leg?”

“Broken, I think.  The pain is getting worse.  Whatever he gave me is wearing off.”

She looked around, thinking, searching.  What do they do?  Josh saw that she was trying to figure out what to do and gently grabbed her arm and she looked at him, startled as if out of a trance.

“Leah.  Listen, to the west there’s a city.  You can go there.  Leave me in the cabin and ... “

“What?  Are you crazy?  I can’t leave you here!”

“You have to, I can’t go that far.  You can move fast by yourself and come back within a day.  It’s just one day, you can do it.”  Even as the words left his mouth, he didn’t want to say them.  He wanted to be with her and not worry about anything anymore, and the thought of letting her go filled him with an emptiness that terrified him.

“I won’t leave you.”

He reached for her and they held hands, “I don’t want you to leave either.  But we can’t stay here.  Who knows how these machines communicate.  A hundred of them could be on their way for all we know.”

“Then you’re coming with me.  We do this together or not at all.”

“I can barely walk Leah.”

“Then I’ll barely walk with you, but we’re going together.”

“Ok, ok.  Wait, go grab the gun and the backpack first.  Whatever we can use.”

When she returned from the cabin, she kneeled to help him up and he threw his arm around her shoulders, and together they both got to their feet with much wincing from Josh as he held his side.  His good leg was bruised and sent waves of pain through him, despite being functional.  As the blood pumped to his head his face throbbed where the bruises and bumps protruded.

Leah turned and felt sorry for Josh when she saw his exasperated and broken face, once handsome but still with eyes that glowed with love for her, and they exchanged grim smiles as they started on the last leg of their journey together.

They followed
the road west.  They tread upon the dilapidated highway at an agonizing pace as Josh’s energy and determination waned with every step.  Leah did her best to hold him up and carry him forward, lifting his slipping body more and more as the hours wore on.  His arm slung over her shoulder, at first was light on her, but now weighed heavily as the weight of his body dragged her down.  She was the only one capable of carrying the rifle now, which was slung across her back and knocked against her with every step.

Leah finally gave out and they both tumbled to the ground and Josh let out a painful gasp as bolts of pain shot up the length of his body.

Leah lay motionless, her body numb with exhaustion and breathing heavily.  Josh coughed and held his torso injury that Knicte had sewn up.  The temperature was dropping once again and made their plight all the more unbearable.  Caustic, polluted storm clouds swirled and jetted above them like wayward souls going to some ethereal home.

Any lesser person would have had debilitated mental faculties and a resigned mind, but Josh kept his focus and plainly told Leah they needed to find shelter soon.

“I can’t feel anything, I can barely move.”  She complained.

Josh winced as he lifted himself up and looked to Leah, “You have to.  Come on, get up.”  He stood on his own power, suddenly flush with renewed energy and reached down to lend a hand.  Leah couldn’t believe he still had it in him to keep going, but in that moment it gave her the inspiration to follow and she took his hand.

They leaned on each other as they went, taking careful and methodical steps that turned into a rhythmic, purposeful movement that seemed to carry them forward effortlessly.

“There,” Josh said, pointing.  A grocer truck lay skidded on its side underneath an elevated pipeline that ran parallel with the highway.  The back door was swung open and lay flat on the ground, allowing them to step in without much effort.  Leah helped him in first and gently helped him sit down.

There was little left inside the truck, just old, torn packaging of whatever goods had been in there.

“We need to close the door,” Josh said.

“It’ll be pitch black if I do that, let’s keep it propped open.”

“It’ll be pitch black anyway with the storm over us.  Close it, we’ll stay warmer.”

She stood, half bent at the doorway to avoid her head hitting the ceiling and stared at the brackish clouds overhead and the diminishing light of day.  She reached down and grabbed the latch and pulled it closed.

They were in complete darkness.  Leah shuffled back carefully and slid down next to Josh.

They lay there together, too exhausted to speak.  Josh leaned against her and she put an arm around him and pulled him close, laying her head on his.  He felt weak and vulnerable for the first time and she felt his body laying heavily against hers for warmth and support.  She kissed his head and a sad discovery welled up inside of her.  They weren’t going to make it, and this may be one of their last nights together.

After some time, Josh spoke with a dry and weak voice, “Leah.”

“Yes?”

“I want to tell you something.”

“You can tell me anything.”

Josh paused.  Leah took his hand, “It’s okay.”

When he spoke his voice was distant, “His name was Trevor Wade.  He was thirteen, and ... I – I killed him.  I killed him Leah.  He was scared like me, and I uh, I just ... did it.  Of all the things I’ve done in my life, it’s the one that I can’t live with myself for doing.  I’m a demon.  The one thing that I want most is to be with you now, but even that I don’t deserve.”

“Josh,” Leah responded calmly.  “It’s okay.  I know you didn’t mean it.  You’re not a killer.  Killer’s don’t have a conscience.”

“I did mean it.  At the time I meant it.  I hated the Academy, but there was no escape from it.  There was one day I felt so hopeless, so angry ... I decided to give the Academy what they wanted.  They made us fight.  We knew our boundaries and most fights were bloody, but we didn’t kill anyone.  It was part of the training, so we knew it was just part of the regimen, we didn’t really want to fight.  But Trevor, he lost his fights a lot, and losing the fight meant further punishment.

“He was sick of it and I saw it in his eyes.  He was scared.  Scared of what would happen if he’d lost, and his eyes were wild.  He fought like his life depended on it.  He was like an animal.  Any other day I would have fought and won and he’d live, and he’d be punished.  That day though, I decided to give my heart and soul to the Academy.  Not because I wanted to but because I hated them.  I wanted to show them what they wanted to see.  What they really wanted us to become.

“Even the students had no idea what was about to happen.  Two kids at the end of their ropes and ready to fight to the death.  And I lived.”

She couldn’t see, but she put her hand to his face and turned it towards hers.  “I forgive you,” she said with sincere compassion, and kissed him softly.  She knew now why he was weighted down so, why his heart had been so cold and heavy.

With a heavy heart, he lay his head against her shoulder and let her comfort him.  The nightmares that haunted him at night were absent this time, and he had slept peacefully.

Leah was the first to wake, and she startled as if coming out of a dream.  When she opened the door, it appeared to be late morning and the clouds had stagnated above them.

She helped Josh stand but he was in excruciating pain. Their stomachs growled and panged for food, but worse of all was their dehydration.  Their mouths were nothing but sticky muck.  Leah helped Josh out of the truck, strapping on his pack and slinging the rifle once again.

They sloughed onward.  They were down to their last ounces of water, only drinking sips at a time.  Josh held little hope they would find anyone in the city.  From what Leah had tried to explain to him, Knicte was a lone survivor of a war long since ended.  How he managed to live for so long was a mystery they would likely never solve, or why he was still intent on hunting those machines when there was nothing left to fight for except his own survival.  It may have been his sole purpose in life, to keep his mind sharp and away from the loneliness that inevitably followed his every waking hour.  Josh understood that all too well.

He stopped abruptly and had Leah hand him the rifle.  He raised it at something lying off the side of the road.  Face up in a ditch, rusting, and lodged in gritty brown sediments was one of the machines.  Leah instinctively grabbed onto Josh as he pointed his rifle at it from the hip and hobbled closer, leaning on Leah as he went.

Josh gave the rusted machine a kick in the head.  Its body was sheared in half at the waist and stuck in a morass of accumulating mud as a trickle of water ran under it.  It jerked but couldn’t do anything more.  The machine shifted as if it was trying to move or raise its arm to get at them, but its battery was too depleted to do anything other than gyrate in place. 

Josh placed the rifle against its forehead and fired a single shot.  Birds nesting in a nearby tree squawked and scattered every which way at the sound of the report which seemed to echo for eternity.

They continued on, walking together along the edge of the highway, following it for another mile as they eyed abandoned vehicles, ruined structures and refuse that had collected into rotted piles.

After awhile, they crested a hill along the highway and found themselves staring at a horrifying revelation that stretched for miles before them.  At first, they couldn’t quite make out what they were seeing but once they descended it became shockingly apparent.

Leah held Josh tight, “Oh my God ...”

“Jesus.  Look at this.”

Melted remains of trucks and passenger cars stretched for as far as the eye could see towards the city.  Along the sides of the road for a good hundred yards in each direction, a blackened wasteland full of bleached bones and hollow trees.  Nothing had grown in the area since.

The bones were everywhere and covered the ground so thoroughly as to make it impossible to walk any further without stepping on the deceased.

“They tried to escape the city...”

Leah held her mouth as she saw the small bones of babies and young children, the brittle remains entombed within their mother and father’s grasps, skeletal fingers fused to rib cages and mouths agape.  Nobody had been spared.

The clothing of the dead had since been seared away by flame and fire.  Necklaces and rings and other artifacts were melted to the bones from the intense heat.  Vehicles barely resembled their original form and were but warped lumps of metal as if made of wax.

With one arm around slung around Leah, Josh encouraged her forward, “Come on.  We need to keep moving.”

A pain in her chest arose as her body flushed and resisted going though the sea of death, but she forced herself anyway and they both moved on.

It was unnerving even for Josh, but for Leah it was eating away at something concrete inside of her.  How could God allow such a thing to happen?

They built up to a steady pace as they navigated the open air graveyard.  By the time they cleared the main kill zone, Josh had determined that at least tens of thousands had died.  Whatever happened had occurred in a flash, vaporizing all organic matter and leaving the bones exposed to the burning sun.

Leah turned to look back but Josh stopped her, “Don’t.”

“There won’t be anything when we get there,” she whispered, her face pale.

Leah looked at him with an empty gaze that took him by surprise and saddened him at the same time.  She was losing hope, something Josh had been barely clinging onto since they landed and now he found himself trying to muster all he had, for her sake.  He pulled her close, “If we don’t, we move on to the next city.  We know people are alive so we just have to find them.”

“Like on earth?”  She remarked flatly.  “They’re all dead.”

“You’re right, but here, there’s life here, we’ve already seen it.  There’s others out there Leah, I promise.”

“Josh,” she pleaded.  “How can we do this?  Why did they send us out here like this?”

He knew she wasn’t asking to receive an answer.  She knew the answer, she just couldn’t grasp why it had come to where the fate of the human race was now in their hands, as they stumbled and starved their way to an empty city on an alien planet.

“I don’t have the answer Leah.  Maybe your book does.  What does it say?”

Leah only frowned and looked away.

He had hoped to bring her back by referencing her faith, but it was precisely that which was causing her despair.  He let it go and tried walking ahead of her, but soon she was by his side again to help him and they pushed closer and closer to the city.

Soon they came upon the urban sprawl that had been built for miles around the towering skyscrapers that loomed in the distance.  The evening sun with its blood red fire had settled behind the gutted steel beams of the towers that marked a once proud and intelligent civilization.  Josh saw in that pride the same arrogance that had destroyed earth.

As they entered a small town, they shuffled down streets lined with
 
brick and mortar buildings with their windows missing and interiors gutted.
 
Houses and commercial buildings made out of lesser material had either burned to the ground or collapsed from years of disuse.
 
Those that remained standing had ceilings that bowed in the middle as if some invisible finger was pushing down on it.

Only a hardy weed had grown up and through every crevice and crack in the streets, the sidewalks, and the ruptured and warped
 
floors of buildings.  Josh felt like some space faring archaeologist examining ancient, alien ruins for the first time.
 
Yet little here seemed alien except for minor deviances in architecture and designs of common items that were just as
 
easily found on earth.