A Cold Black Wave (22 page)

She leaned back at an awkward angle and kicked the door open to the outside, nearly falling over with Josh.  Leah pulled him outside and fell to the ground, her lungs opening up and sucking in air.  It was tinged with the black smoke, just enough to make her cough uncontrollably.  Josh stirred on the ground and she yelled for him to stand up, and as he did, used what strength she had left to lift him to his feet.

Josh barely hung onto her as he fell in and out of consciousness, and she struggled to move him more than a few feet until they both fell to the ground again.  She crawled in front of him and stood, grabbing onto his shirt to try and drag him further away, but she only fell down again.  The black smoke had disappeared, wafting into the air and becoming diluted from its original pitch black state.

Blood ran from the corners of Josh’s mouth, from his ears, his eyes, his nose.  Leah reached out to him with shaking hands, “Josh…” she cried weakly.  “Wake up, come on, we need to go.”  He didn’t respond.

Leah’s vision blurred and she felt groggy.  Her eyes shifted and couldn’t focus.  She happened to look down the street again, and two machines were approaching their position.  Leah tried to wake Josh, but there was no response.  She staggered to her feet, lunging forward and only keeping herself from falling by planting a hand to the ground to balance.  She made it to the other side of the street, hiding against a building, sliding down to lie there.  Her head bobbled to the left, her eyes feeling tired and wanting to close.

She looked at Josh lying there in the middle of the street, alone.  With her last strength, she stood and made her way back to him.  One of the machines, still a ways down the road, took cover and fired on her.  Light flashes zipped down the street and crashed into the ground, leaving blackened holes.  She lay down next to Josh in the street and turned his face towards hers.  “Don’t look,” she said as she held him, his eyes still closed.

The street erupted in a blinding, loud exchange of gunfire that deafened her and seemed to bring the heavens down in one final crashing end.  She craned her head, and saw a shimmering mirage moving towards her.  On the rooftops, blasts of light seemed to be materializing out of the air, directed at the machines with withering precision.

Then, the mirage gave way and disappeared, and in its place a man that reminded her of Knicte.  He slung his rifle on his back, reached down and lifted her up with ease.  Another man appeared, and ran to Josh, throwing him over his shoulder.  The soldiers carried them both out of the street to an alley, and away from the battle.

One of them worked on Josh, injecting him with something, and examining his eyes and inside of his throat.  Then he turned to Leah and did the same with her, injecting her twice.  The two men communicated with each other in rapid, hurried fashion, using the language that Knicte had used.  The soldier, who sat next to her, spoke into a device as if communicating with others, speaking rapidly and in grave tones.  The man looked at her, and she saw that he was like Knicte.  The other glanced at her as he went back to work on Josh, and he too was the same.  Their faces, and even some of their limbs, were all disfigured.

The fighting continued, the ferocious gunfire subsiding into measured, paced shots as both sides seem to dig into their positions.  After some time, the man tending to Josh left with his rifle in hand.  The other stared at Leah, but when she looked back, he cast his eyes away.

A woman appeared, or what seemed to be a woman, and she unlocked a device that opened to reveal much more sophisticated equipment to work on Josh.  With ease and precision, she hooked up various tubes and IV’s to his body, and the devices she had brought with her spun to life.  She pulled his eyelids back and shone a light inside them.

She too had been in a hurry, and hadn’t realized that Leah was sitting next to her, and seemed shocked when she finally did, pausing in her duties and blinking with disbelief.  A smile briefly crossed her face, and she turned back to reviving Josh with renewed intensity.

Leah’s eyes turned heavy.  The sound of strange guns echoed from the point of battle, diminishing in her ears, and as she faded, a small group of women and children, poorly clothed, survivors traveling together as nomads, appeared in the alley where she lay.  They gazed upon Leah and Josh with hushed amazement, and a woman emerged from the group and gently walked to her as a mother would a child, and kneeled down next to her.  She too, as the others, was disfigured in some way, yet Leah could see in her eyes a very human presence, and a warm sorrow in them that watched Leah with hope and trepidation.

The woman raised a hand and softly touched Leah’s face, and she smiled joyfully, her eyes unblinking as they filled with tears.  Those who came with her spoke excitedly and rushed to Leah, all reaching out to touch her, to see if this perfect being was real, to touch and believe in a miracle.